Shiver
by Tiny.Tinsel.Wings
Summary: When Sam's family relocates to Lima the summer before his senior year, all he wants is normalcy. But when he meets Mercedes, he learns that there's much more to life than fitting in. It contains some M. It's like tiny. The title is based on the Coldplay song not the book. The rating was changed to M for themes (abuse, addiction, suicide, etc.). I own nothing from Glee or Coldplay.
1. Platforms or Nothing Gets Crossed Out

AN: I've gone back and edited it for easier reading. The reason the paragraphs were bunched in the first place was because I was employing a particular writing style of my own creation. In this style, I never put the narrator's words in quotations, and sometimes it causes his words to blend into his thoughts. I understand how that makes it much more difficult to read. In light of this, I'm editing. I'll leave the experimental writing style for my own private use. Or maybe someday everyone will praise me for it, and I'll be the new E. E. Cummings.

* * *

The one thing Mercedes always told me was to live like I was dying. I laughed at her, "Been listening to Tim McGraw lately?"

She raised an eyebrow and gave me the queerest look she couldn't get rid of. "No, I was thinking about the truck you just got and how the brakes are starting to go."

"Thanks for the reminder," I replied.

She smiled, caressing my cheek, and opened the door to her place, dancing her way inside to a song playing only in her mind. Her body jiggled a bit as she sashayed, and I bit back a groan as I watched her. She had the most beautiful body. "Why should I change for other people?" She'd say. "People spend thousands of dollars to get curves like mine."

The first time she asked, I offered arguments of health, not realizing it was a rhetorical question. So she shut me up with a kiss then gave me a million reasons why women with curves were better. Since then, I could never think of a response and told her so. She was always blunt like that; raw to her very core. She worked ten blocks from her house at an old record store, and she'd ride her bike there occasionally when it rained. She was 19, and I loved her.

Last summer my family moved from Tennessee to Lima, Ohio. I was 17 and going into my senior year of high school. I hated it. I couldn't forgive my parents for uprooting me my senior year. I figured that I had at least four years to spend out of Tennessee when I went away for college, so why start them early?

"I need you to be a bit more optimistic, Sam," my dad said one day. "Stevie and Stacey look up to you, and when you react like this, it affects them." So I tried to look supportive of my parents in front of my younger siblings. I must admit that it was one of the harder things I'd done. I said goodbye to my boarding school friends and my sort-of girlfriend, Emma. Life as I knew it was over.

I spent the first two days locked in my new room before Mom decided she'd had enough. She opened my door enough for me to see it was her. "Get showered," she said. "We're going shopping."

I could tell by her tone that it wasn't a debate, and I also knew that we weren't headed to the mall. My mom was an avid collector of things and always dragged me or my younger siblings out to different flea markets and secondhand stores. She never had any intention of buying anything specific. "Shapes appeal to me," she'd say. "I just want something cool."

It was usually a photo, sometimes a lamp or a watering can. My mother had 12 photo albums full of "extended family members." Ever since I was little, I'd heard stories of Uncle Job who lives in Wichita and how his accident on the horse led him to buy a barber shop or Auntie May who ran off with "that ol' carpetbagger Samson." I figured out these weren't really our family members or real stories when I was eight, but I still entertained her whenever she'd talk about them.

I guess that's where my comic book obsession comes from. Most of the time I don't even mind going with Mom because I can look for vintage comics. I've found some that are worth thousands of dollars apiece because most people don't realize the value of them. I have a few non-comic vintage items, too, that are pretty special to me. Like Peggy, my blonde Gibson guitar. And I'm building a pretty good collection of albums.

By the time Mom coaxed me out of the house, she knew the location of every secondhand store in town. Mercedes was working at the record store next door to the second one Mom went to, and I moseyed over the moment I saw it. I noticed her almost immediately. She was humming along to Billie Holiday while organizing the records in the Jazz section. I moved to a section in the back marked VINTAGE and rummaged through a bin, trying to keep my eyes glued to what I was doing.

"Do you need help with anything?" Her voice was like wind chimes, and I turned to see that she'd advanced upon me without my knowledge. She was close enough for me to see she had a small nose ring perched atop her right nostril. "You like the Beatles?" She asked, gesturing towards the album at which I'd stopped. "You seem like a Beatles fan."

I raised a brow curiously. "They're pretty good, I guess."

She chewed on her bottom lip. "Nah. Rolling Stones, I bet."

"Yeah, I like them better."

"Sweet. Well we have a really rare copy of their first EP. It's pretty expensive, but you look like something like that's right up your alley," she said.

She walked off, and I stared after her a moment. Did she work here? Ohio people were crazy, I was learning. They were nice but insane, and those type of people are always loose cannons. It was at least better than Cleveland. Mom, according to her schedule, was lost in gem sweaters by this time, so that gave me only a few more minutes to hang out here before she came and we headed to another store. I sat down in the closest chair to rest my legs while Billie's smooth vocals blended into Mick Jagger's edgier ones. The girl came back and stood beside me. "My manager left a note not to sell it, but I thought it would be nice to hear it anyways," she said.

"Yeah. It's great. Thanks," I replied.

This time, I got a better look at Mercedes. She was a brown-skinned, compact, coke bottle beauty in a doctored black "LIVE FREE OR DIE" tee-shirt. Her dark hair cascaded over her shoulders and down her back and was brightened by brown highlights. She had an easygoing, pretty smile that contrasted with the steely attitude suggested by her gold-studded boots, which looked almost brand new. She wore curve hugging black jeans and even her nails were polished to a light reflecting shine. "Diva," I whispered.

"What was that?" She asked.

"Nothing. I like your hair," I replied quickly.

It wasn't a lie. I'd actually tried to grow out my hair once, but my mom, the calmest woman I'd known, threatened physical violence if I didn't cut it. I didn't believe her until she broke a broomstick against the wall.

"Thanks," she said, twirling a strand around her fingers. "I've been growing it out for about three years now."

I nodded and drummed a beat on the arm of the chair, waiting for her to leave.

"So were you looking for anything specific?" She asked.

"No. I'm just waiting on my mom now. She's at the thrift store next door." I shrugged.

"Oh," she said. "Well, I'll still be here if you need anything." She smiled and made her way to the cash register, this time whistling along to Mick Jagger.

Mom burst through the door a few minutes later, her arms laden with bags. Her eyes swept the room for a moment before resting on me. "Sam!" She called out, and I pushed myself out of the chair and walked to her before she could shuffle more than a few feet. "I found Aunt Rosaline," she whispered, and I nodded.

"What's in the rest of the bags?" I asked, prying a few out of her hands.

"Nothing," she replied sheepishly.

" Well this is a whole lot of nothing," I said, peering into one of them, into which I saw a flowered throw.

"Thanks for helping." Mom deadpanned and smiled at me in a way that let me know that I should stop harping about her purchases if I knew what was good for me. She scanned the store and her gaze rested at the vintage section in the back. "Did you see the vintage records?" She asked me.

"I checked them out."

"Find anything good?"

"Not today," I sighed.

"Well that's unfortunate. Maybe next time." She looked hopeful.

"Maybe. I wasn't really planning to return to this particular store any time soon," I replied.

Mom turned to leave, and I moved to follow. "Have a good rest of your afternoon and come back again," the girl at the counter called out with a smile.

"Thank you! We will," Mom replied. I smiled back, now really eager to leave.

I'd forgotten all about the record store until a few days later when _Satisfaction_ popped up on Pandora, and an image of the brown-skinned beauty whistling along came to mind. I was Googling the Stones first EP when Mom came around to let me know dinner was ready. "What are you doing?" She asked.

"Oh. That girl from the record store the other day started playing the Rolling Stones first EP, and now it's stuck in my head," I replied.

"The first signs of a courtship?" She asked, hopeful.

"Not a chance. I'm thinking about the song, Mom, not the girl." I shook my head.

My mom was always hopeful when I met girls. She made it clear that she wanted lots of grandchildren as soon as possible. I swear that she was jealous of the parents on _16 and Pregnant_. Dad, on the other hand, kept me well stocked with protection. He'd had a few secret talks with me on the importance of keeping a hat on my willy. I didn't even use it, though. Emma had been a bit crazy and a prude, but the rest of my friends back home were more than glad to take it off of my hands.

"Well, you should get out and start making more friends. I worry about you, Samuel," Mom said sadly.

"I'm trying out for the football team next week."

"Good. Sawyer loved football. He was the quarterback, you know?" She had a faraway look in her eyes then.

"I know, Mom. I'm just going to go and wash up, and I'll be down in a second," I replied.

She nodded and closed the door behind her. Sawyer was my older brother. He died when I was ten, and I don't think my mom ever fully recovered. For two months after his funeral, she called me Sawyer, and I answered for a while. When I finally stopped she sort of shut down. She stopped telling her stories for about three years as well. Gradually, though, she started telling them again with a fervor that has yet to subside. When Sawyer died, there were only five photo albums.

* * *

AN: The title of this chapter is called "Platforms or Nothing Gets Crossed Out" based on the songs by Ani DiFranco and Bright Eyes, respectively.


	2. The New Year (New Low) or The Reeling

We found out that I was dyslexic when I was five after I kept reading books upside down and mixing up words. My teacher, Mrs. Mertens, thought I was being oppositional, and I was timed out every day. By the time I was tested for learning disabilities, Mrs. Mertens had recommended that I be switched to the behavior classroom. By the fifth grade, I was reading two grade levels behind and had started skipping school. Pulaski Academy was my Jerusalem. My parents sent me there at the beginning of the sixth grade because it was the best school in Tennessee for kids with learning disabilities, and I thrived. I started making friends. I learned that I was smart. McKinley wasn't the same. The first few days were harder than I expected. My teachers had been informed about my learning disability, but they didn't really understand. There wasn't a lot of help for students like me. When Mrs. McKinnon, my English teacher, had me read aloud in class, I stumbled over the words, and a few jocks in the back sniggered. By the end of the first week, I found myself fumbling through lessons, and the tricks I'd learned at PA to make reading easier faded as my failures fueled my anxiety.

Football tryouts weren't much better. These two guys in particular, Phil Lipoff and Bobby Surette, seemed to have it out for me from day one.

"You new here, Lady Lips?" Phil, the taller of the two asked as we jogged out onto the field a few days into practice. He'd bumped into me coming up on the right as Bobby pushed in on the left.

I looked at each of them in turn for a moment. "Lady Lips?" I asked.

"Yeah," he replied, nodding in my direction. "For those soup coolers taking up half of your face."

I sucked in my lips involuntarily for a moment then released nonchalantly. "Yeah, I'm Sam," I replied. They weren't going to get to me.

"Well make sure you watch yourself, _Sam,_" Phil smeared my name, his voice low and menacing, "because I've been here for three years, and no one's taking my spot." He and Bobby stopped suddenly, tripping me before running to catch up with the others.

"Get your ass off my grass, Six!" Coach Beiste, a woman built like a bulldozer, was glaring straight at me, well at the stained six on the back of my jersey. She hadn't seen me get tripped. "If you can't even make it to the fifty yard line during practice, then what good will you be in an actual game! Get over there!" I picked myself up off the ground, not bothering to dust off, and joined the line.

My moping didn't escape my parents, and Mom tried unsuccessfully to cheer me up with new strings for Peggy. I restrung the guitar to please her, but it didn't change how I felt. Only one thing could make me feel better.

"I want to go back to Tennessee," I said over dinner. Everyone stopped eating and stared at me.

"What was that?" Dad cleared his throat and set his fork down, wiping his mouth with his napkin.

"I said I want to go back to Tennessee, I repeated. "I'll live with Grandma Jean. I just want to go back to my old school."

Mom and Dad exchanged looks and then turned back to me. "Well, Sam," Dad began, "it's really complicated." He glanced at Stevie and Stacey who were staring between me and our parents. "And, unfortunately, that's just not a possibility."

I scowled at my peas but didn't reply, remaining calm only for my siblings' sake. Why wasn't it a possibility? It wasn't like we couldn't afford it. Dad was giving Mom that look again, and I pushed back my chair from the table. "I'm not hungry anymore," I mumbled.

"Can I have Sammy's dessert, then?" Stacey asked, a huge smile on her face and her eyes shining. Mom frowned.

"If it's any consolation, I talked to your principal today," Dad said, "and I signed you up for a peer tutoring program." I rolled my eyes. One more thing singling me out.

"I know it's hard, Sam," Mom broke in, "but just give it a try."

Tutoring was held during my fourth block study hall, and the paper that I'd received during homeroom told me to meet my tutor, a kid named Artie Abrams, in the back corner room of the library. I shifted my backpack on my shoulders as I made my way through the stacks. No one recognized me here, but this was still embarrassing. To be perfectly honest, I considered not even showing, but that wasn't fair to this Artie kid. At the very least, I could tell him I didn't want to be tutored face to face. I could see Artie bent over a physics book through the window. His neat brown hair brushed the top of his glasses, and he wore an old man's sweater and bike gloves. He closed the book when I entered the room and invited me to sit down.

"Nobody wants to be seen tutoring," he said with a smile. "That's why I pick this room. So you can sneak in from the stacks."

I smiled back uncomfortably.

"You're Sam, right?" He asked. "I'm Artie."

Artie was all business and asked lots of questions about techniques I already knew so that he could figure out the best ways to help me with my work. He took lots of notes and made a few suggestions that he said would help me to read faster and comprehend things easier. I was skeptical nonetheless. What could he teach me that I hadn't already learned at PA? A lot, it turned out, and before I knew it the bell was ringing, and I had to scramble in order to get all of my things together for my next class. Artie waited patiently, and when I had finished, he backed his chair out and rolled around to me. My eyes widened, and I quickly averted my gaze.

"It's okay," he said with a smile. "I didn't exactly warn you."

I smiled back because I didn't know what else to do, but somehow I wasn't uncomfortable. "So you're in a wheelchair." It was a fact, not a question.

"Ever since I was eight," Artie shrugged. "It adds to my swag, I think."

I nodded. "Yeah, I think so, too."

I held the door for Artie and walked with him out the library. When we turned to go opposite ways, Artie called my name out to stop me. "I hope that I was a little helpful," he said, and I nodded. "Well, do you want to do another session?" He asked, and I nodded again.

"How about tomorrow?"

I liked Artie. He was genuinely nice and funny, though not very popular. I suspected it had more to do with the fact that he got dressed from his granddad's closet than the fact that he was in a wheelchair.

"It's not about the clothes you wear but about how much swag you have," he said gleefully.

"Just be you and the sexy will flow through," I added.

"Exactly," Artie agreed.

I felt comfortable with Artie because he knew what it was like to feel different, and that made me feel a little less alone. I told him that I was trying out for the football team, and he wished me luck. "I played on the team the last two years," he gloated.

I stopped writing and looked up at him. "How? I mean, well, you know."

"They wheeled me down the field like a battering ram. I gave a few guys concussions," he laughed. "Ultimately, though, I became something like Assistant Coach."

"What about this year? I haven't seen you." I folded my arms and leaned back in my chair.

"I'm Glee Club President, Student Council VP, and I'm directing the school musical. I was in Glee, directed the musical, and played football last year, and it was brutal. So between all of this year's stuff and college applications, I just don't have the time." Artie leaned back as well and tried balancing his pencil on the edge of his finger.

"You could always quit Glee Club," I offered.

Artie looked offended. "Absolutely not. Glee's awesome. You should check it out."

"No way. That's social suicide," I said shaking my head.

"Yeah, like you have a social life as it is," Artie smirked, and I balled up my paper and threw it at his head.

Artie plugged Glee a few more times before I finally agreed to check it out. Mr. Schuester was, by far, the creepiest teacher I'd met. I'm sure that the Glee kids would disagree with me, but I wouldn't have been surprised to learn that he was giving private lessons in Shower Singing 101 or teaching Orgasm Arias. The singing part was pretty cool, though, and I could see why the self-proclaimed misfits of the school found solace here. I probably would've been sold on it despite Mr. Schue if it weren't for the football players. Not ten minutes after leaving the choir room, I found myself on the receiving end of two cherry slushies to the face.

"Welcome to Glee Club, Lady Lips!" Phil and Bobby laughed down the hall.

Screw this. Solace or not, I did not leave Tennessee for this.

"Sorry Artie," I said during our next session. "There's no way I'm joining Glee. Do you know how everybody talks about you Glee guys?"

"You get used to it after a while," Artie shrugged.

"Well I can't. I'm the new guy. I'm already on the outside looking in. I don't want to start off three touchdowns behind."

"It's cool," Artie said. "But if you change your mind, you're more than welcome to join us again."

"I'll think about it," I lied.

Football tryouts were more of a drag than usual since word of my involvement with the Glee kids got around, but I tried not to let it affect my game. I worked harder than ever to prove myself the last week of tryouts, and Coach Beiste definitely took more notice of me, a fact I happily relayed to Artie.

"That's cool," he said. "Looks like you might actually make the team. When do you find out?"

"Tomorrow," I said.

"Good luck."

By the time the session was over, I was halfway done with the rough draft of my first paper of the year.

"I was thinking," Artie said as we packed our things to leave. "I'm meeting a few friends at The Lima Bean tonight if you want to come. We're just discussing plans for the musical, but it'll be a good time."

"That sounds great," I said, and it really did. Other than Artie I had only chatted briefly with these two blonde cheerleaders, Kitty and Brittany, but I wouldn't call them friends.

"Be there at six thirty," Artie said.

"Definitely," I replied.

The coffee at The Lima Bean was better than Starbucks and cheaper, too. The place also had a more welcoming atmosphere. Artie was running a little late, and for a moment, I was worried that he wouldn't show. My fears were quelled when he rolled in. He was followed by an Asian guy and girl and a black girl who were all talking animatedly. The two girls looked familiar, but I couldn't place them. I waved over Artie, and he broke into a smile as he parked his chair next to me.

"You made it!" He exclaimed ecstatically, patting me on the back. Artie's friends dropped their bags, saying quick hellos, and then went to order.

"Are you getting anything? I can just wait here until you're all set," I offered.

"No, it's fine. Mike's got me covered," Artie replied. He began pulling notebooks out of his bag and mumbling things about choreography. "I told you we'd be working on stuff for the musical, didn't I?" Artie asked. "Because Mike's only here for the rest of the week, and this is the only time he had to help."

I nodded and picked up a song book. They were doing Grease. The group returned shortly after, and Artie wasted no time introducing us. Mike, the lithe Asian guy, had graduated two years ago and was on a long weekend from dance school in Chicago. I'd seen Tina, the bubbly Asian girl, in the Glee Club, and I recognized Mercedes as the pocket-sized diva who worked in the record store.

I could tell that she recognized me, too, because she broke into a smile and said, "I thought you looked familiar! Rolling Stones, right?"

I nodded, and her smile was so infectious that I couldn't help but to smile back.

"Well, if you're still interested, my manager relented on selling that EP," she said.

"I'm not really a big fan," I said.

"You like them better than the Beatles. That's enough where I stand," Mercedes replied.

"Hold up," Artie broke in. He stared between Mercedes and me and smoothly leaned in closer to her. "You two know each other?"

"Just in passing," Mercedes shrugged. "Sam came into the shop a few weeks ago, and we chatted for a bit about the Stones."

I nodded and took a sip of my drink. Mercedes was then distracted by a joke Mike was telling, but Artie continued to glance at me and smile. I just buried myself in my math book, the one subject at which I was actually pretty good.

Mercedes hadn't changed since I last saw her. She still had the same welcoming smile and soft curves as before. It was her fiery red pants that caught my attention this time because they, like the studded boots she wore on our first encounter, hinted at an underlying fierceness. But for now, at least, she was laughing and lost in conversation with Mike and Tina. Tina had a boisterous personality. Artie told me later that she hadn't always been that way. She had a fake stutter Freshman year but had blossomed during her time in Glee Club, and she was trying out for the Cheerios this year. They had all been in Glee Club together before Mercedes and Mike graduated, so the conversation quickly turned to inside jokes and things about people that they all knew. And even though they weren't consciously leaving me out of the conversation, I still felt like an outsider. I drummed a beat into the arm of my chair, something I defaulted to whenever I felt uncomfortable. I attempted to focus on the conversation but instead found myself studying the patterns on Mercedes' pants and how the lines traced her curves.

Artie nudged me, and my eyes shot to his face. He smiled and shook his head. "You're staring," he mouthed.

My cheeks prickled, and I took a sip of my drink to hide the redness. "So, how's the musical coming?"

Artie made a better effort to include me for the rest of the evening, and the unease from earlier slowly dissipated. By the time we got up to leave, I felt pretty comfortable around them.

"Mike and I are going to BreadStiX if you guys want to come," Tina offered as Mike went to toss everyone's trash. "Have you heard about BreadStiX, Sam?" She asked, and I nodded. "You know that they are legally forbidden to stop giving you breadsticks."

Mike returned, gathered his things, and said goodbye. "Anyone?" Tina asked again, but Artie, Mercedes, and I declined. Tina hugged us all goodbye, and she and Mike made their way out to Mike's car and drove off. Artie frowned for a moment, and I knew that look from a mile away. I'd lived it a thousand times when I was dating Emma, which might be worse.

"How're you getting home?" I asked, attempting to distract him.

"Oh, my dad'll be here in a few minutes," he said, looking at me. The momentary sadness was gone. "You?"

"I think I'm just going to walk. It's a nice night, and I don't live too far from here," I replied.

"Absolutely not. Mercedes can take you," Artie countered.

"It's okay. I can walk," I insisted.

"It's fine, Sam," Mercedes interjected. "I don't mind. Really."

I gave up protesting because it was clear that it wasn't an argument. Artie's dad arrived within a few minutes, and Artie waved goodbye to me and his "sugar mama" with a smug look on his face. Mercedes made her way to her car, unlocking it as she went, and, seeing that I hadn't moved to join her, called my name. I walked over and got in.

"So, where am I going?" She asked with a smile.

Mercedes was funny, but she also had a lot of sass, and for that I could understand why she was such good friends with Artie. She drove slower than the speed limit so she could ask me questions about my family and whether or not I liked Lima.

"It definitely grows on you," she said. "Most people never leave."

"What about you?" I asked.

"I got out once," she replied with a sad smile, and I could almost see the shadows of bright lights in her eyes.

"And you're back here because?"

"Life," is all she said.

It was clear to me that I shouldn't pry, so I drummed to the song and hummed along for a bit. She told me about her best friend, Kurt, and how one of their favorite pastimes was to take bike rides during thunderstorms. I paled at the thought of that. "Isn't that kind of dangerous?"

She looked amused. "Well, it's kind of one of those 'she only smokes when she drinks' types of things, but cancer and car wrecks will get you faster than lightning, don't you think?" She smiled, and I smiled, too. When she dropped me at home, Mercedes made me promise to visit her at the record store sometime soon, a request I actually felt excited to fulfill.

"I made the team!" I called Artie up the minute I got home. It was Friday, and the day had been brutal.

"That's great, Sam!" He exclaimed on the other end. "What position?"

"Quarterback."

I was now stretched out on my bed resting my sore muscles. Phil, who'd been hoping for that spot, ensured I felt his anger and chased me with his car for several blocks as I was walking home. But Artie didn't need to know that.

"Let's celebrate. BreadStiX on me! We can invite Mercedes and Tina," Artie offered.

I was way too sore to go out, so I declined and disregarded the disappointment in his voice. Besides, I didn't know Mercedes enough to agree to a double date with her and Tina. Artie would never admit it, but I knew that's what he really wanted.

"Maybe a different time, Artie. I think my parents are planning something," I replied.

My family was extra excited. I caught Stevie winning an imaginary game in the backyard as Stacey did cartwheels and cheered him on. Mom threw a party involving several dozen "extended family members," effectively making it the creepiest celebration ever. I thought about stopping it, but I wasn't too keen on another broomstick episode, so I let her have her bit of fun. At school, Artie helped me to study plays whenever we had some free time.

"You should think about coming back as Assistant Coach again," I told him.

He shook his head. "I already told you. I have too much on my plate as it is. I barely have time to apply to college." He sighed and scribbled through the play he was working on, balling it up and starting again on a fresh piece of paper. "My dad wants me to go somewhere in-state, but I was definitely born to make waves. There ain't jack here, and I'm getting out," Artie asserted.

Between Artie and Mercedes, Lima seemed to be the place where people ended up with crushed dreams and deadbeat jobs, and I had no intention of ever getting trapped here and becoming a Lima Loser.

* * *

AN: The title of this chapter is called "The New Year (New Low) or The Reeling" based on the songs by Death Cab For Cutie, Middle Class Rut, and Passion Pit, respectively.

The characters are all an amalgamation of different characters in the show. For example, Sam and Artie have a conversation originally had by Finn and Sam, Phil and Bobby do and say things originally attributed to Karofsky and Azimio, and Tina says something originally said by Santana. This is a way for me to cram in three years of Sam's Glee life into one while allowing for the season four characters to also be used without using some of the characters that have already graduated. All characters that graduated last year in the show have been gone for two years already because of the setup for Mercedes.

I refuse to make Sam dumb. I will not.


	3. Kids or Walking With A Ghost

AN: This chapter is super long. About three times as long as the last. I hope that you still enjoy it and that there aren't too many grammatical and spelling errors. Forgive me if so. And I hope you don't hate me or throw your computer when you get hints of a blossoming romance. Just remember which characters the story is written under and know that they are endgame.

* * *

The first game of the year and my opportunity to prove myself was in less than twenty four hours. I had been staring into space since climbing into bed two hours ago, and I wasn't any closer to sleep. I'd spent the last thirty minutes attempting to dissolve into the world around me, trying to become the sound of my acoustic ceiling and join the applause of the Aurora Borealis, but the silence only heightened my awareness of the mattress sinking beneath my weight. My comforter, which made my skin itch in unbearable places, and the drumbeat in my chest served as a constant reminder that I was alive and still in my bed. I pushed off the covers and rolled out of bed, my feet protesting against the cold hardwood as I quietly slipped out of my room.

The house felt empty even though my parents and my younger siblings were only a few feet away. There was a muffled bump from my parents' room, and I froze in my tracks. The house was alarmed so I wasn't concerned about a robbery, but I wasn't too keen on running into anyone right now, either. I crept quietly and slowly pushed open the bathroom door. My mother moaned my father's name, and he shushed her.

No.

I turned on the cold tap to cover the noises escaping my parents' room and looked in the mirror. There were dark circles underneath my eyes and the beginnings of a pimple on my right cheek, something that only ever happened when I was stressed. I dragged my hand down my face and splashed my eyes with water.

The football team had been riding my ass ever since I became quarterback. Most of my teammates didn't really trust me, but to my credit, it had very little to do with my skill and much more to do with Phil's anger towards me. After playing alongside him for three years, my teammates did trust Phil, and the more he slandered me, the more doubtful of my abilities my teammates became. Coach Beiste swore that I could be a great leader, but I wasn't so sure anymore.

Home life didn't quell my anxiety about football. I'd been wearing jersey number six since beginning tryouts, and the moment I realized what I'd done, my stomach sank. Six was my brother's number. I hoped it would bring me more luck than not, though, because my brother was a great quarterback. However, when I showed up at home with the number emblazoned upon my chest, my mom started crying, and my dad shooed me to my room. I asked for a new jersey the next day, but none were available in my size, so that's how Coach Beiste got to know me. "Get your head in the game, Six!" was my moniker for the first half of tryouts. I wore the jersey without comment, but inside I was storming with emotion.

Mom hadn't cried since I first came home in the jersey, but it definitely affected her. She stopped going thrifting and began to give me strange looks. When I told her that I had made quarterback she smiled and hugged me, kissing my cheek. "Sawyer would have been so proud to see you now," she whispered in my ear.

When she pulled away, her smile had changed, but I couldn't pinpoint it. Was it longing? Happiness? No one else seemed to notice, but then again they all had tunnel vision for me. After the creepy party, she packed away the photo albums. Dad furrowed his brow when he saw her marking the boxes for the attic, but he said nothing.

We went out to BreadStiX as a pre-game day celebration. It was a tradition in my family to celebrate the day before a game as a good omen. I called it counting chickens before they hatched, but I was never one to turn down a good meal.

"A toast to our wonderful son," Mom said with a look to dad, "and your awesome big brother." She smiled at Stevie and Stacey. She stretched her glass out in front of her, her eyes beaming, and we all raised our glasses in return. "Good luck out there tomorrow, Sawyer."

My stomach lurched, and I was on my hands and knees kneeling in front of the toilet, releasing everything. I sank to the floor and flushed the toilet, wiping my mouth with my hand.

There was a pregnant pause as the realization of my mother's actions over the past few weeks began to sink in. Her strange looks. Putting away the photo albums. Dad shifted uncomfortably in his seat while Mom considered me fondly and blinked back tears. I avoided her gaze. "My dear boy," she whispered.

"But Mom that's Sam," Stevie said slowly. "Not Sawyer."

"Sam?" She tried out the word and shook her head to clear it. "Sam! Oh my goodness. I'm so sorry. Of course you're Sam. To Sam!" She raised her glass up higher, and we repeated the gesture, clinking together our drinks.

Mom and Dad stayed in the car when we got home. It was the only place they ever argued.

"Are Mommy and Daddy getting a divorce?" Stacey asked me as I tucked her in. It had been more than an hour since we'd come home, and my parents still hadn't made it into the house.

"They would never do that," I replied, kissing her forehead. "They love you too much. Get some sleep."

She rolled away from me, and I watched her for a minute before leaving. After Sawyer's death, my parents nearly divorced. Mom was slipping away, and I caught Dad crying. I'd overhear conversations with words like "joint-custody" and "alimony." After I refused to answer to Sawyer, Mom was hospitalized, and Dad stuck by her side until she came back to us.

By the time they finally came in, Stevie and Stacey had been in bed for a half hour. Dad patted me on the shoulder before heading to bed himself. Mom gave me a hug. "I'm sorry, Sam. I love you so much," she said.

"I love you, too, Mom," I replied. She made her way upstairs, and I sat in the living room a few more minutes before going to bed.

I climbed into the tub and turned on the shower. The water was warm against my skin, and the constant patter against the tub floor was like the music of raindrops. I could tell Coach Beiste that I was the wrong choice, that she should give the position to Phil. He'd been there longer than me, and I'd seen him in practice. Yes, he was a dick, but he was definitely the truth on the field. I could fake an injury. I turned the water up as hot as I could stand it until my skin turned pink from the heat and every pore on my body screamed in deafening tones. Loud enough to drown out my thoughts. Loud enough to drown out everything else. I stumbled back to my room and crashed on my bed. I was exhausted now. I laid on my stomach, and, pressing the pillow over my head to quiet even the silence, I fell into a restless sleep.

"Are you nervous about tonight?" Artie asked. I jerked my head up and looked at him. We were in our regular tutoring room. I'd asked for some silent study time when we first got together, and he agreed. At some point in the last half hour he'd put away his books, and he was staring at me intently. I glanced down at my paper onto which I'd been doodling spirals. I don't know for how long. "It would be perfectly normal if you were."

"A little, I guess. Well, a lot, actually," I admitted, putting down my pen. I felt a bit better when I woke up this morning, though by the looks of my sheets I'd been tossing and turning all night, but I was beginning to taste bile again. "I'm not sure if I can do this, Artie."

"You seemed off this morning," he nodded.

We had a pep rally that morning introducing us to the school so that everyone would be pumped up throughout the day. I was a ball of nerves and barely dragged my feet up the stairs to the auditorium stage. Fortunately we only had to do that and lead our school fight song. The rest of the rally was hearing Principal Figgins joke of a pep talk, watching the Cheerios dance around on stage (Tina looked great in her uniform and was as good as the best of them), and listening to the Glee kids cover some song, which everyone was actually into it despite the way the Glee kids were treated. I was surprised to see a few Cheerios and football players in the club. I hadn't really been paying much attention the one time I'd gone.

"But, hey, dude, listen. Coach Beiste chose you because you're a beast, too. The beast of the Beiste. She led us to our first State championship in twenty years after a season in which we were 1-9. She knows what she's doing. Don't worry." Artie gave me a huge smile and a thumbs up but relaying the legacy I needed to help uphold probably wasn't the best pep talk he could've given me. I ran my hands down my face and groaned.

"Well how about this," He said. "If football doesn't work out, you can always help me with the musical."

"Artie, I already told you—" I began.

"I'm not asking you to be in it, but we could definitely use some extra hands on the crew. It'll be a way for you to take your mind off of things, especially if you stink." I gave him a look. "I'm not saying that you do," he responded quickly, "but you can't sit around and wallow in self pity, Sam. You're better than that. You're a creative person, and it could be an artistic outlet for you."

"Maybe," I sighed.

"Great!" He said. "Here." He pulled out a copy of the script and pushed it towards me. "You can help me pick out props this weekend."

"Do you just carry these around with you?" I asked, flipping through.

"There's nothing wrong with being prepared." He shrugged and pushed his glasses further up his nose bridge.

He talked about comic books for the last few minutes to distract me, and the taste of bile receded back into my stomach. I sat through my next class, and I took notes, but I honestly had no clue what was said. I drifted to my locker to put my books away and get my notebook for Chemistry. _Grease_ was peeking out from one of my folders, and I flipped through the script quickly. How the hell did Artie talk me into this? Someone grabbed my shoulder and turned me around, shoving me into the locker beside mine. Phil snatched the script from my hands while Bobby stood there like a Neanderthal and held me up against the locker. I pushed him off.

"What do we have here?" Phil said, glancing at the title with a smirk. "Looks like somebody's joining the gay squad."

"Hey give that back!" I raised my voice and reached for the script. I was tired of this already.

"Slow down there," Bobby said, grabbing it from Phil and holding it out of my reach. "I think it's time we helped him get his head back in the game." He gave a nod to Phil who smiled widely. They began to tear up pages and threw them in my face.

We could easily get suspended for fighting. I'd heard rumors of a little-enforced zero tolerance physical violence policy, but right now I just didn't care. All I'd wanted since day one was to have an easy senior year, but these guys were hell bent on making me feel like crap. I don't remember consciously deciding to punch Phil, but when I tried, he dodged it easily, and my fist connected instead with the locker beside his head.

"He just took a swing at me!" Phil had been looking for a fight since the day I took his spot, and if that's what it came down to, then screw it. He started to remove his jacket, all the while begging for me to come at him while Bobby amped up the situation. Neither of them actually made a move.

"Sorry to interrupt," Artie said, rolling between us from out of nowhere. "I'm actually glad you're here to see this." He nodded to Phil and Bobby as Phil pulled his jacket back on, annoyed.

He turned to me. "Thanks for agreeing to help with the musical, Sam. I really needed the help, and I really appreciate it." I crossed my arms and leaned against the locker, shaking my head as Artie turned to Phil and Bobby. "So are you two interested in helping? We could really use some more bodies."

"Dude, take him!" Bobby spit out, pointing to me, but Phil hesitated.

"This wheelchair kid is in the way! What if I knock him over or something?" Phil was visibly torn.

Bobby looked from Phil to Artie. "Ah... There's something not right about hitting a kid in a wheelchair."

Phil pointed a spindly finger in my face, and I knocked it out of the way, but he didn't retaliate. "You know the only thing saving you right now is my moral code. I don't hit crippled people, but I'll be back," he threatened, hitting the lockers. "We gon' be back!"

They walked off, and I nursed my hand for a moment before bending down to collect the papers from the ground.

"Those guys are jerks, Sam," Artie said, and I looked up at him. He looked worried. "But you don't have to fight them to prove yourself. They'll see how good you are on the field. They _know_ how good you are; that's why they target you."

I stood up and closed my locker. "Thanks for the pep talk," I replied sarcastically. "But that's not going to help during the game, Artie. Phil plays right guard. If he's pissed at me, I'm going to get sacked more times than Jay Cutler which means that we're going to lose." I sighed.

"How the hell does a right guard even play quarterback?" Artie asked. "I thought he'd at least be a running back."

"I don't know, Artie, and I really don't care right now." I handed him the ripped papers. "I'm sorry about your script. I gotta go."

Artie didn't try to stop me. I walked out of the school and down the street. I didn't need to be back there until six. I couldn't go home. Mom would realize I was skipping if I showed up early. I walked with purpose and an unusual calm, though I didn't know where I was going until I was outside and hoping against hope that she was working today.

The bell above the door announced my arrival, and there was Mercedes with a warm smile beaming at me from behind the counter. "Sam!" She chimed. She was a breath of fresh air, and already I felt better by seeing her. "Come in. Sit down. How are you?"

I made a beeline for the chair I'd sat in the first time I visited the store, and Mercedes walked over as I settled into the plush green cushions. She leaned against the table nearest me and patted me on the shoulder. "I'm doing good, Mercedes, really good," I said, but there was no conviction in my voice.

A sad smile played on her lips. "Well you look like you've been run over by somebody's truck, and the last time I checked," she glanced at the clock above the door, "school lets out at 3:45."

It was a little after two. A laugh escaped me, and I slumped deeper into the chair. Mercedes walked away and the prints on her skirt swayed back and forth as she walked, acknowledging me. Taunting me. She pulled up a stool then sat down so that we were on the same level. I was looking anywhere but in her eyes now. I wasn't even sure why I'd come anymore.

"Well, we can sit here for the next few hours staring around the store and twiddling our thumbs until I have to kick you out, or you can spill why you came here," she said finally. "I don't know what's wrong, but I can guess that you didn't just come by to sit in a thrift store chair and learn more about leopard print skirts."

"No," I said finally, looking at her even though it was hard to do without blushing. "I really don't know why I came here, but you said that I should visit you sometime, and I guess I just needed someone. I just thought that maybe…I don't know." I looked away again, embarrassed.

"Tell me about it."

I looked up, and she was smiling. Mercedes looked so concerned, so attentive, that I found myself spilling everything that was bothering me. She didn't judge or interject. She just listened.

"I didn't know you had a brother who died," she whispered when I'd finished, and her eyes were full of tears, but she batted them away.

"Yeah. When I was ten," I sighed.

"Do you miss him?" She asked.

"Sometimes." I shrugged and looked down, away from Mercedes' piercing gaze. "But I don't even remember much about him now even though he was my favorite person growing up." I closed my eyes, gripping the arms of the chair. "There was this one time when I was little and I was trying to be so cool in front of all of his friends. We had this skateboarding ramp in our backyard, and I'd just really learned how to ride a bike without training wheels a few weeks before that. I couldn't have been older than six or seven, and Sawyer was probably fifteen or sixteen." I smiled and opened my eyes. "And I came up with the idea to do some great trick on my bike even though they were ignoring me and Sawyer had told me to go inside a few times. So I ran and grabbed my bike, I dragged it to the top of the ramp, and everyone stopped and stared at me as I mounted it and pushed off. And let me tell you, that was a cool moment. Flying down the ramp at full speed, feeling like Dave Mirra or something. For a moment, I felt invincible.

"You can probably guess that I completely busted my ass," I laughed a bit. "I banged up my knee pretty badly, and all of Sawyer's friends started laughing. Sawyer didn't say anything, though. He just walked over and picked me up, then took me inside and cleaned up my knee. 'Come on,' he said, and he took me back outside and showed me how to do the trick the right way."

"I'm sorry, Sam," Mercedes whispered. "I'm really sorry."

I shook my head, still looking down. "I resent him, too, you know."

"Because of your mom," Mercedes said, finishing my thought, and I nodded.

I had never admitted that to anyone, but I realized that it was true last night. I resented Sawyer because that was easier than resenting my mom for loving him more than the rest of us. I could live with that, but I hated myself for it.

"I'm sorry about your mom, too," she said.

I shook my head. "Thanks, but I'll be fine."

"I know, but still," she said, grabbing my hand. She squeezed it and held on a little longer than necessary before letting go. She got up and stretched her legs, and I quickly wiped my face. When did I start crying? Mercedes glanced at me over her shoulder and smiled.

"What?" I asked.

"I know you probably don't ever want to think about it, and I'm sorry if I give you nightmares, but you have to admit that it's a little funny that you heard your parents having sex last night." She grinned wider.

I shivered with the thought though glad for the distraction. "Don't remind me. God, I think I'm traumatized."

Mercedes laughed, and I laughed too. It felt good, freeing even. She went behind the counter, and I got up to check out some of the new records. I felt lighter, more fluid. "Was that your first time hearing them?" She asked.

"Uh, no, actually," I admitted with a frown. "I caught them once in the kitchen. I blocked it out, but thanks for the memories."

Mercedes laughed again. "You're welcome."

She began humming to the music. It was _Revelry_ by Kings of Leon, and I could hear that if she were to sing, she'd have a really beautiful voice. "Why a music store?" I asked. "There are plenty of other places around here with help wanted signs in the windows."

Mercedes shrugged her shoulders. "I like music, and they were hiring. Eddie's a great boss. Why?"

"I don't know," I replied. "I'm just curious. I heard you humming."

"Oh," she said and chewed on a nail.

"Do you ever sing? Sing something for me."

"Excuse you? What's with the demands?" She asked placing a hand on her hip.

"I was just curious." I put my hands up to show that I was backing off. "I won't ask again. Sorry."

"It's fine. I used to sing all the time. I still do sometimes, but I don't know. It's just a hobby," she said shaking her head. She wrote a few things on a piece of paper while I looked through more albums. "So your first game is tonight, right?"

"Yeah," I said, looking up. She was staring at me.

"Are you nervous?" She asked.

Artie had asked the same question just a few hours ago. I'd felt like puking then, but now I just felt ready. "No," I answered honestly.

"Good," she said. "Make sure you kick some ass and show those pricks why you're quarterback."

Mercedes had me call my parents to let them know where I was, and Dad agreed to bring my uniform pieces to school for me. Mercedes had BreadStiX delivered for us, and we snacked before she took me back to school. I thanked her before I got out of her car.

"Are you coming to the game?" I asked as her car sat idle in the school parking lot.

She smiled and shook her head. "Sorry. I've got some errands to run today but maybe another time."

I nodded. "Thanks again for dinner and the ride."

"No problem," she replied. "I'll watch the news tonight to see how badly you beat the other team."

I waved as she drove off and found my dad in the parking lot. "Beat the shit out of them, son," he said, handing me the bag.

I waved to Stacey and Stevie and kissed mom on the cheek before heading to the locker rooms. I changed quickly and reviewed plays as people filled in the spaces around me. I was focused; I was ready. Phil knocked into me as he headed to his locker, breaking my focus. We stared each other down a moment but didn't do anything.

"That dude sucks."

I looked over, and this new kid, Ryder Lynn, was sitting next to me. He was a sophomore, and I'd seen him dancing around on the field. Coach Beiste had yelled at him almost as much as she yelled at me. "Tell me about it," I replied.

"Don't worry about him, Sam," he said. "Most of us think you're alright. You made All-State in Tennessee last year, right?"

I nodded. I hadn't told anyone that.

"I googled you," he said quickly. He must have seen the shock and confusion on my face. "Sorry if that makes me a creeper."

"It's cool," I replied with a shrug.

"Alright let's huddle up!" Coach Beiste had pushed her way into the middle of the locker room and was waving everyone over.

"I'll catch you after the game," Ryder said getting up, and I nodded. The team crowded around Coach Beiste. We'd be storming the field in less than five minutes.

"For the past two years we won State, and now we have a title to uphold," she said. "Before coming to McKinley, I won division championships at three different schools. And as many of you guys can attest, winning means everything to a community. Grades go up. The streets are cleaner. Crime goes down. It's a sense of pride, of unity. And this school deserves that."

Cheers went up all around, and Coach put her hand up to settle us. Faint cheers floated into the locker room from somewhere outside. The band was playing our fight song. "We came out on top last year against one of the hardest teams we've ever had to face, and, yes, we were good, but we were more than that. It was our chemistry that put us ahead." She looked pointedly at me, Phil, and Bobby. "You don't have to like each other, but you have to respect each other. You guys have got to find a way to come together or we're gonna get our asses kicked from here until Tuesday finds a saddleback full of buckwheat!"

Bobby scowled, and Phil nudged him. "For years people out there and even in this community looked down on this team, but we've shown them that the Titans have plenty of fire left. Now the Wildcats are gonna come out swinging prepared to knock us down a notch, and they'll take that victory if you let them, but don't make it easy, and don't you dare give in. Respect each other. Take care of each other, and we will show them why we're state champions!"

The locker room erupted into what probably would have sounded like a riot from the outside if the fans weren't twice as loud, and we got into formation and made our way to the field. As we approached, the sounds of the crowd grew louder in our ears, cheering us on, welcoming us home. The flood of red jerseys sent the crowd into a frenzy. If I weren't so afraid of being trampled by the guys behind me, I probably would've stopped to take it all in. It was never this insane back home.

The Lincoln High Wildcats were known for rushing defense, conceding just 54.4 yards per game, and last year, then junior defensive end Tad Cooke had set a school record with 7 tackles for a loss against Ridgemont. That combination alone would put serious pressure on our offense. Cooke was now a senior and one of the anchors of their team. He was staring us down and sizing us up, ready to take this victory by any means necessary.

"You'd better bring it, Lady Lips," Phil yelled at me. He'd blocked my view of Tad and poked me in the chest. "If I have to give you my spot, then you sure as hell better bring it."

"Don't worry," I said. "Just make sure I have a clear path."

We got into formation, and the whistle blew.

We needed them to fall behind early. Adrenaline coursed through my veins and everything was muffled by the sound of my own heartbeat pounding in my ears. There were flashes of red all around me, flags waving in the stands, Cheerios flipping in the corner of my vision, and all I could think was DON'T LOSE. We pushed hard on the opening drive and found ourselves in a fourth-down situation at Lincoln's 31-yard line. Coach Beiste called for us to line up in punt formation, and Lincoln prepared for us to kick. Instead, Jason Jones, our punter, lofted a pass to Andrew Shipper, who drew a pass-interference against sophomore cornerback Aaron Craig. We now had a first down at the 16-yard line.

I was heating up and so was my team. I kept looking out for Phil, and he hadn't let anyone sack me so far. He talked a lot of crap, but at the end of the day, he wanted to win as much, if not more, than I did. Having two years of championships under your belt could change you. It opened doors to college and beyond. I called the plays and my teammates responded like a well-oiled machine. We were the lifeblood of this school, and no one was going to take that away. On the third down I looked for an opening and saw Andrew gunning it to the end zone. I fired a pass down the left sideline, and he burned Aaron Craig for a touchdown giving us a 7-0 lead halfway through the first quarter.

"Let's go!" Andrew yelled, and the crowd loved it.

Everyone was on their feet chanting our name, and I could hear Coach Beiste over it all yelling at us to get back into formation. Lincoln woke up after that. I could almost see the veins popping out of Tad's neck as he became more focused. He seemed to be looking right at me, but I was calm. They answered on their next possession. On the very first play of the series, Lincoln moved into our territory as their quarterback and another kid hooked up on a pass play. They missed a first down following it, and Kendrix Haymitch made a field goal to put them on the board and cut the lead 7-3.

We held the lead through the end of the first quarter, and Coach Beiste rallied us together before the second. "They're not scared," she yelled, "and they're coming back. Look alive in the second quarter and don't let them get ahead! Hold them with your life. Let's go! Titans on three!"

Lincoln took their first lead in the second quarter. We missed a field goal, and Lincoln marched from their 33-yard line and drove towards our end zone. Their quarterback threw a wide open touchdown pass, giving them a 10-7 lead.

"Dammit!" Coach Beiste yelled. "Close those holes, and get your heads out of your asses!"

We pushed back. On third-and-4, we were driving on their 13-yard line, and I needed people to get open. Jason was in the end zone, and as I threw the ball to him, someone tripped him, and Lincoln was flagged for pass interference again. We got another first down with goal to go. I called the play and my teammates moved. Ryder was open on my right, and I passed to him. He juked Tad on his way down the field and ran two yards up the middle for a touchdown that put us up 14-10. We barely had time to enjoy it before they struck back. They pushed us hard and fast on the next series, and Taylor Bradford caught a 32-yard touchdown pass to give Lincoln a 17-14 advantage into halftime.

"Lincoln is not going to give this up easily," Coach Beiste said during our halftime huddle. "But we have to keep pushing back and holding the line. We gave up those touchdowns. They were both wide open passes. We can't afford to make those mistakes in the second half. Tad Cooke is collecting heads, and unless you want him to have yours, I suggest you stay focused, push back hard, and most of all hold the line!"

Coach Beiste explained her strategy for the second half. I was already tired. Most of the team was dragging in the locker room, and we still had half a game to go. Tad was a bulldog, but it was time to put him on a leash.

"Good job, Ryder," I said, scooting in next to the sophomore. "You were definitely there when I needed someone open."

"You were doing the work. I'm just trying to make it just like everybody else on the team," he shrugged.

"Just make sure you're staying open," I said. "They'll be looking for you, though, since you made that touchdown, but I'll be looking for you, too."

"I'll be open," he said, giving me a fist bump.

The Cheerios were finishing up some halftime routine involving whips of fire when we stormed back out from the locker room. I swear Coach Sylvester would send half of them to the ER before the game was over. I'd already seen one of them walking around school in a neck brace. I shook off thoughts of the hospital and focused on how I was going to win the game. The Lincoln mascot taunted us from the sidelines, and their cheerleaders were trying their hardest to distract us. Their team seemed reinvigorated from their halftime pep talk, and they stormed the field hungry. I caught Tad's stare, and he pointed at me, but I couldn't let that faze me as we got into formation and the clock started.

The third quarter was a hard fought battle. We held the line and pushed hard, and Coach Beiste yelled from the sidelines. We took the ball down field and Ryder scored on a nine-yard run. The whistle blew, and we were penalized because Bobby was holding Tad Cooke on the play. Coach Beiste was going crazy on the sidelines, and I did my best to ignore her as we collected ourselves and restarted. On third-and-12 from the 20-yard line, Tad came out of nowhere, and I was thrown to the ground hard before I could throw a pass.

"This year is for the Wildcats," he said menacingly before pushing himself off and away from me.

Ryder helped me up, and I saw Phil smirking from the corner of my eye. We'd lost seven yards and had to force a field goal. It went wide to the left.

Coach Beiste called a timeout, and we huddled up quickly. "You guys are letting them put fear into you, but I didn't come here to lose. And you," she spat at Phil, "your job is to protect the quarterback at all costs! Do not let them break my line again or it'll be your ass!"

We got back in the game and our cornerback intercepted a pass on the first play, returning it 19 yards to our 38-yard line to set up the score. Ryder carried the ball on a six play scoring drive with our defense holding Lincoln out of the end zone. Tylor Davis, our placekicker, then kicked a field goal and tied the score 17-17 with 12 seconds left.

The stakes were high heading into the fourth. Twelve minutes of game play would declare one of us victor, and I was determined for it to be McKinley. The Lincoln players hustled around the field, getting into position, and when the ball flew, our cornerback intercepted it again, returning it 14 yards to their 29-yard line. Lincoln's defense pushed us backwards, and Tad broke our line and headed straight for me. He put more force behind his tackle this time, and I was knocked out of breath when I hit the ground.

My legs went numb for a moment, and I was actually scared that I was paralyzed. This could be it, and even if feeling returned, I could just lay there and pretend to be out cold. I could fake it, and they'd take me out of the game. No. I'd come too far for that. My toes tingled as I dragged myself off the ground. The crowd chanted my name as I pulled myself together and dusted myself off.

"You okay man?" One of my teammates asked, and I nodded in response. If Tad Cooke wanted to put me out of commission, he'd have to try a lot harder than that.

Determination was etched across all of our faces as we moved inside Wildcat territory on our fourth consecutive possession, and adrenaline surged through me as I passed to Andrew. We gunned it for 80 yards, moving the ball inside the 20-yard line, and we grabbed a 20-17 lead when Tylor connected on a field goal.

I saw my parents and my younger siblings screaming in the crowd, and something tugged at me on the inside. Were my parents as proud of my brother when he was in this same position, the number six blazing on his chest? Did they scream this loud? Louder? I fumbled the snap on the 38 yard line. It was recovered by Lincoln's defensive tackle and they went to work, scoring a touchdown on their next possession and giving the Wildcats a 24-20 lead.

There were just over two minutes remaining in the fourth quarter, and everyone in the stadium was up on their feet watching silently. Lincoln was bracing itself for a victory, but we remained unfazed. The Lincoln defense was forced to punt from deep in its own zone. Kendrix Haymitch's kick came up short, giving us possession at their 44 yard line. We held them on three plays, but they fought back, and I was sacked on both first and second downs, leaving us facing fourth-and-16 from midfield. I got up more determined to win each time. My teammates hustled around the field, following my guidance.

I scanned the field for an opening and, spotting Andrew, hurled the ball in his direction. It missed as Lincoln's defensive back, Jeremy Potter, blocked him. Lincoln rallied together, excited about their impending victory, but the referee threw a flag.

"What the hell?!" Their coach yelled.

"Personal foul, 42," the ref called out.

The Lincoln players were angry. Jeremy was flagged for grabbing Andrew's facemask, giving us fifteen yards and an automatic first down. New life flowed into our veins. The crowd was getting noisy again. We advanced inside the red zone. I completed a third-down pass to Bobby and was sacked on the next play, but Lincoln was given a five-yard penalty for having too many players on the field, giving us another first-down. I tossed three straight incompletions, with their cornerback batting down a third-down play in the end zone. We faced another fourth down, so I hit Ryder over the middle for eight yards, down to the four-yard line.

It was second-and-goal with 17 seconds left. I called the play, and the center snapped the ball. I rolled out to my right and attempted to run for the touchdown. I barely missed being tackled by Tad but was stopped short by someone else at the two-yard line while still in bounds. The clock continued to run, and we were out of timeouts. There was enough time for one final play if we could get the ball in motion fast enough. I pushed myself up as fast as I could and screamed to my teammates to get moving. We scrambled to the line of scrimmage, and I could hear the crowd counting down the seconds. Five seconds, and I called the play. Three seconds, and the center snapped the ball. Two seconds. There wasn't enough time. I spiked it, praying for a little bit of help though realizing it was probably too late. The final buzzer never sounded. There was one second left on the clock.

The crowd was going nuts, and Lincoln coaches, players, and the newscasters argued whether the clock should have expired before the ball was grounded. Coach Beiste was incoherent from the sidelines. It was all coming down to this. We got into formation, and I was as ready as I would ever be. When the ball snapped, I again rolled to the right. I scrambled, off-balance, with the Lincoln defensive line bearing down on me. Ryder found an opening in the crowded end zone, just beyond a crowd of leaping Wildcats, and I saw him. I lofted a pass that flew just over Jeremy Potter's outstretched hand and into Ryder's, giving us a 26-24 victory.

The stands erupted and players swarmed Ryder in the end zone. My legs wobbled, and I struggled to stand upright. I was exhausted, both from excitement and fatigue, but I wasn't excited about the prospect of being trampled, so I held myself up. I'd done it. We'd done it. I searched for my family in the stands, but they were impossible to make out within the sea of crimson. So I turned to the closer faces nearby and joined my teammates to sing our fight song and celebrate.

I slathered on icy hot in the locker room. My muscles were sore. I gathered my things up quickly so that my family didn't have to wait long for me to come out. My teammates kept patting me on the back as they passed, and I'd replied 'thanks' to chants of 'great game' since the moment we left the field. Phil had bumped into me earlier and just nodded in my direction when I looked up. That was probably the most acknowledgement I could expect from him, which was fine with me. Ryder found me on my way out of the locker room, and he fist bumped me.

"Great game," he said.

I nodded, "You, too."

"I'm glad you're the quarterback," he said. "We definitely would've lost this game if you weren't. I think the guys know that now."

I looked around at the satisfied faces on my teammates, and I couldn't help feeling a little prideful. "Maybe. It was everybody, though. If you weren't open, then this would be a whole different story."

"Whatever. Who spikes a ball and stops the clock with one second left?" He said shaking his head. "That was genius."

I scratched my head and smiled, "I guess it was just a little."

"You're too modest, Sam," Ryder replied. "Take some credit." I shrugged. "Well, I gotta get home. I'll see you around. Are you going to the after party?"

I didn't even know there was one. "No. I'm tired. I think I'm going to head home, too. My family's waiting."

I walked out of the locker room and back onto the field, making a beeline towards the parking lot. I could see my family's car from here, and my little sister and brother waited on our trunk. It was a nice night out, and the breeze felt warm on my skin. I closed my eyes and slowly hummed _Revelry_. I smiled. Mercedes was going to be so excited.

"Hey Evans. Where are you going so fast? You got somewhere to be?" A soft and raspy alto voice called out to me, breaking me from my musings. I stopped, opening my eyes, and turned around to see who it was.

She was blonde and fit and not too much shorter than me. Her Cheerios skirt bounced around as she regarded me with striking green eyes. I'd seen her around a bit, but she was always with the Cheerios or hanging out with some of the other popular jocks. I also knew she was part of the Glee Club because I'd seen her performing with them during the pep rally. Her name was Quinn.

"I'm heading home," I said nodding towards my family. "You?"

She glanced around the emptying field. "I don't know. I was thinking about going to the after party, but it'll probably be a total wash. All the cool people don't seem to be heading that way anyways." A smile played on her lips, and I smiled back.

"You were great tonight," she said.

"Thanks." My face was starting to warm.

"I know they didn't treat you the kindest, but I was cheering for you." I held my breath as she moved in closer to me. I could see that she had a few small freckles on her nose. "I'm glad it wasn't in vain."

"Lor menari," I blurted out. Quinn raised a brow. "It's Na'vi, the, the Avatar language," I quickly explained. "It means you have pretty eyes." Quinn looked confused. "I've seen that movie like six times. Verbal vomit. I- I'm sorry," I stammered. I didn't mean to say any of that. Of course I'd attempt to flirt in Na'vi because I definitely wanted the head cheerleader to know how big of a dork I was.

But she smiled anyways. "That's cute," she said. "But I won't hold you from your family any longer. I see a couple of cute little blondies waiting for you over there. I wouldn't want to keep you."

In all honesty, I'd forgotten about my family, and even when Quinn reminded me, I wasn't so eager to get back to them, but she'd already moved away from me and was starting to walk in another direction. I stared after her, and she looked over her shoulder and smiled.

"You wanna, I don't know, maybe hang out some time?" The question was out of my mouth before I could stop it.

She turned to face me but continued to walk backwards. "Maybe," she replied. "We'll talk Monday." She turned back around and gave a little wave.

I fist pumped the air out of excitement and jogged over to my family who all sat with the biggest smiles. Mom hugged me, and Dad patted me on the back. Stevie kept recounting the last play and how cool I looked spiking the ball. Stacey stared me down like she was trying to solve a mystery.

"What is it, munchkin?" I asked her.

"Was that your girlfriend?" She asked.

I laughed nervously. "No," I said. "Why would you think that?"

"She looked like she could be your girlfriend," Stacey shrugged. "You don't have to hide your girlfriend from us, you know. I have a boyfriend."

"You have a boyfriend?" I asked incredulously.

"Yeah," she said frankly. "His name is Peter, and he's in my class. He gives me half of his candy."

"You're too young and far too pretty for a boyfriend, especially one that will give you cavities," I said, my hands on my hips. "How does this Peter kid look? I need to speak with him."

Stacey shook her head and locked her lips with an invisible lock then threw away the key. I laughed and messed her hair, scooping her up off the trunk and giving her a hug.

We piled into the car and headed home. Mom offered to cook me something while I showered and got ready for bed. I was actually going to bed just after nine o'clock on a Friday night. I made a mental note to start making weekend plans. Maybe I'd find something to do with Artie or even Quinn. I couldn't help but smile at the prospect of hanging out with her. She was hanging around the few times I'd chatted with Kitty and Brittany, but she never spoke to me. She barely even looked my way. But now? _She'd_ approached me. And maybe it was because I had proven myself as a good quarterback, but maybe it would've happened anyways.

I took my giant bowl of macaroni and cheese to my room to eat in privacy and called Artie. He picked up on the third ring. "Who dis?" He answered.

"Jack Ryan, you've just boarded the Red October," I said. "Sean Connery."

"So remember when I told you earlier this afternoon that you'd do fine and you left me with a ripped up _Grease_ script?" He gloated.

"Sorry about that," I replied. "There was a lot of pressure on me, man. My parents were kind of going crazy over it, and Phil and Bobby kept giving me shit. I didn't mean to take it out on you."

"It's cool," Artie said. "I have a fresh script waiting for you at my house. You can pick it up tomorrow."

"Fine."

"Fine. But anyways, that last play. That was so sick! I was probably the loudest person there," Artie said excitedly.

"I think I heard you." I shook my head.

"So what are you doing tonight?" He asked. "I heard there was an after party."

"I'm staying in," I shrugged. "I'm eating a giant bowl of mac and cheese and going right to bed."

"You can't not go! You have to go. For both of us!" I could picture him glaring at me through the phone.

"Well, to be perfectly honest, I wasn't invited," I admitted.

"What! Hold on. I'm getting dressed, and my dad will be by to get you in fifteen minutes," he said.

"Wait, what?"

"We're crashing it. I know where it's happening. Get dressed!" He said firmly.

"No, Artie, stop! We are not crashing that party. I don't even want to go," I mumbled.

"How are they not going to invite the quarterback to the after party? You won the damn game!" He huffed.

"Seriously, it's okay. There'll be other parties, and I'll go then. I really don't even want to go," I assured him. "I'm exhausted. I barely got any sleep last night because I was so worried about today, and then I was just so done with everything at school. After I left you, I went to see Mercedes."

"Really?" Artie asked. "That's interesting. How is she?"

"She's good. It was weird. She actually made me feel a lot better." I slouched against my pillows and ran my hand through my hair.

"She does that," Artie agreed. "So is this a thing now? Is Mercedes your solace from the world?"

"Maybe. I don't know. It's not really like that. It was just nice talking to somebody that was kind of removed from it all. You know?"

"Yeah, I get it," Artie replied, and I could hear him typing away in the background. "Quick question, though. Are you really tired or just disappointed that you weren't invited to the party? Because Tina's coming over in a little bit, and if you wanted to come over, too, we could all hang out."

I wouldn't have crashed an Artina mixer even if I weren't tired. "No, I'm good. Tired, I mean," I replied. "Have fun, though, and tell me all about it tomorrow. What time should I come over?"

He thought for a moment. "I think around eleven would be good."

"Are you sure you don't want to do late afternoon sometime? You'll probably need all the rest you can get," I teased.

"Shut up, Sam," Artie said, but he still laughed. "I'll see you at eleven."

I hung up and took my bowl downstairs to wash it. Stevie was watching some Disney Channel movie in the living room, and I went to hang out for a few minutes before heading to bed. He smiled up at me as I settled in next to him.

"What're we watching?" I asked, and he told me.

He leaned against the arm rest, his eyes glued to the TV, and his legs were stretched out so that his feet rested on the coffee table. Mom wasn't around to tell him to put them down. He was bigger than I remembered. How long had it been since I'd spent some time with him? He was nine now and we were almost the same age apart that Sawyer and I had been. Sawyer was a better older brother than me, though. He'd hang out with me whenever I asked and always tried to make me feel cool in front of his friends.

"You want to hang out with me?" I asked him, and Stevie peeled his eyes from the TV to look at me.

"Yeah!" He exclaimed. He sat up straight and tall and had a big, goofy grin plastered on his face.

"How about tomorrow?" I asked.

He shook his head. "Dad's taking Stacey and me to Discovery Zone."

Dad had mentioned that earlier in the week, but I was too distracted to remember. "Well, how about next week?"

"Just you and me?" He asked, his brow furrowed.

"Yep," I replied. "A boys' day."

His smile returned. "Okay!" He agreed. "Don't forget!"

"Never."

I kissed his forehead and got up to go, and he feverishly wiped the kiss away before refocusing on the TV. I climbed the stairs and hopped into bed as soon as I got to my room. I felt different tonight, more whole, less worried, and it didn't matter that I wasn't invited to the after party. I won the game. I brought the whole school to its feet, and I would do the same thing every game. If I were still in Tennessee, my family wouldn't have been there to watch me and Emma wouldn't have looked at me like I was the hero of the hour. It was hard starting over, but for now at least, things were getting better. I turned onto my side, closed my eyes, and listened to the world go by my window.

I was up early the next morning. I fought waking up for an hour before giving in and taking a jog around the neighborhood, viewing everything with fresh eyes. I felt fortunate and happy. By the time I got back to the house, everyone else was milling around and getting ready to head out. Mom was bringing the boxes of albums down from the attic, and Stevie and Stacy were running around already ready to go to Discovery Zone. Dad was cooking breakfast. I ate a plate of eggs and a bagel then took a quick shower before getting dressed. Mom was the only one still around when I meandered from upstairs. She was reading the article about the game in the paper, and there was a photo of me in action right at the top. I begged to borrow her car and had to promise to let her meet Artie soon before she gave in.

Artie's family wasn't poor. I could tell that from the outside of the house. It was a small, single-story, mission-style with a well-kept yard and a short wheelchair ramp leading up to a welcoming front porch. I parked behind their white Escalade and made my way to the front door, adjusting the strap of my messenger bag across my chest before ringing the doorbell.

Light footsteps danced to the door, paused a moment, and the door swung open to a girl several inches shorter and a few years younger than me. She had the same blue eyes as Artie, but her brown hair fell in thick, face-framing waves. She still had a bit of baby fat around the edges, but that would probably be gone in the next year. She smiled, revealing clear braces.

"Hi, I'm Sam. I go to school with Artie," I said. "He tutors me, and we're working on the musical together."

"Hi, Sam. Artie's in his room playing video games," she said, rolling her eyes. "Come on in."

She stepped back to let me in. The house was bigger on the inside than it let on from the outside, due mainly to the open floor plan. The girl, who I was certain was Artie's little sister, led me to the living room and gestured for me to have a seat on the couch. She waited until I was settled, then sat on the arm of the nearest chair and twirled a finger around a lock of hair.

I cleared my throat. "Artie asked me to come over, so he probably knows that it was me."

She giggled and smoothed the fabric of her dress. "Probably, but he gets so invested in his games that I'm not really sure he even knows what time it is. You can wait for him here, though. I'm sure he won't be too long." She rocked on the chair and smiled at me, leaning forward and batting her lashes. "Do you want anything in the meantime? We have some leftover pasta from last night. My mom makes the absolute best pasta. Better than BreadStiX. She's teaching me how to make it, too."

"Thanks," I replied with a smile, "but I just ate."

Her face fell for a moment, but she quickly hid it. "Oh, okay. Well do you want to watch something? I think there's a Walking Dead marathon—"

"Joanna?" An amused voice spoke from behind me, and Joanna and I turned at the same time to see a slim brunette woman staring at us from the dining room. She narrowed her eyes slightly as they traveled between Joanna and me. She smiled, but I could still see the accusation forming on her lips. "I didn't know you had company."

"Mom!" Joanna's eyes were wide as she straightened up and hopped off the arm of the chair. "This is _Artie's_ friend. They tutor together and they're working on the musical. He's been waiting about five minutes for Artie so I was seeing if he wanted to watch TV." The words poured out of Joanna's mouth in one breath.

Mrs. Abrams' smile turned into a smirk as she closed the gap between us. "Well, it's nice to meet you, Artie's friend."

"It's Sam," I said.

"Honey," Mrs. Abrams said with a look to Joanna, "you're fawning. Sam is very cute, but I think he's a little old for you. Now why don't you actually let your brother know he has company instead of hogging him all to yourself."

"Mom!" Joanna was mortified.

"What?" Mrs. Abrams replied. "Go on." Joanna's cheeks were inflamed as she quickly slipped past her mom and down the hall, grumbling the whole time. "Sorry about that," she said, turning again to me. "Joanna doesn't have much tact."

I couldn't resist laughing. "Don't worry, Mrs. Abrams. I'm not here for your daughter. Maybe in a few years though."

"Yeah, well, we're hoping to have her married off by sixteen, so that definitely fits our time frame. I'll add you to the list." Mrs. Abrams walked around the couch and sat in the chair farthest from me. "So Artie's tutoring you?"

"Uh, yeah, and we're working on the musical together," I replied. "He's awesome."

"Well that's good." She gave me a once over. "Maybe you'll rub off on him a little. I can't get him out of his granddad's old stuff." She winked at me.

"I'll keep that in mind," I said.

The unmistakable sound of Artie's chair rolling across the tiles stole Mrs. Abrams attention. "Hi, honey," she said.

Artie smiled at his mom then turned to me. He was still smiling, but it didn't reach his eyes. "Sorry, Sam. I wasn't watching the clock."

"Well that's kind of rude," Mrs. Abrams said.

"It was no problem, Mrs. Abrams. Both you and Jackie—" I began.

"Joanna," Mrs. Abrams corrected. Geez, Sam. You're going to have to do better than that if you want to be considered for this arranged marriage."

"Oh, sorry!" I laughed. "_Joanna_ kept me more than entertained while I waited."

"Well, I'll leave you two to whatever you're up to. It was really nice to meet you, Sam, and please don't be a stranger." She messed Artie's hair and disappeared down the hall.

"Come on," Artie said as soon as his mom left, and he whipped around his chair and began rolling down the hall. I hopped off the couch and followed.

His room was the next to last one. It was huge and gave him plenty of space to move around in his chair. The wall directly opposite the door was home to Artie's extensive electronics collection which included a speaker system that would be the envy of any DJ, several gaming systems, and a large TV that doubled as a computer monitor. There was a little couch and two bean bag chairs against another wall. He had four posters above his bed: one of Nicola Tesla, one of Stephen Hawking, one of Michael Jackson, and one of Samuel L. Jackson. I closed the door behind me and sat down on the couch.

"This is awesome," I said, looking around.

Artie rolled to his computer desk and typed in a few things. He searched for a minute, cued up his iTunes, and then turned back to me. The Killers were singing _Mr. Brightside_ from every corner of the room. Artie handed me a copy of the script and waited while I thumbed through it. "So where do you want to begin?" I asked.

"I was thinking we look at a few props online." His voice was tight. It didn't sound like him.

I studied his face to see what was wrong, and though he was smiling, something was bothering him. "Are you okay, Artie?" I asked.

"Yeah," he replied mechanically. "Why?"

"You tell me," I said.

"Really, I'm just a little stressed," he said. "That's all."

I didn't push him. Artie and I were similar, and he couldn't keep everything bottled up for long. He would tell me soon. I moved to sit closer to the computer, and he distracted himself through planning the musical. He looked a little less stressed after making a few decisions even though I was the deciding factor for most of his purchases. A little while later, his mom came to the door to let us know that lunch was ready. It was probably the most awkward lunch I'd had with Joanna on one side of me, brooding Artie on the other, and Artie's mom staring us all down from the kitchen. I spent most of that meal really focused on my sandwich, which I was grateful for since I'd eaten pasta for most of my meals in the past two days. We worked a little longer after lunch. _Every Little Thing She Does (No Such Thing)_ cued up, and Artie leaned his head on his computer desk.

"It's my parents," he blurted out.

"What about them?" I asked.

"I told them that I wanted to be a director," Artie said.

"That's awesome," I replied. "But?"

"They think it's a waste of time. Mom keeps encouraging me to apply to MIT, but I'm not passionate about that. And I keep trying to explain, but they're not listening," he huffed.

"Didn't you direct West Side Story last year?"

"And the Christmas special on the local PBS station, but they see it as a hobby and not a viable career path." He slumped in his chair.

"I'm sorry, Artie," I said. "I have a lot of quick fixes up here," I pointed to my brain, "but parents aren't really my specialty. You know my mom is all screwed up."

"So I've heard," he agreed. "I'm working on it, but it's a pretty slow process. I don't think they'll ever take it seriously until I'm the next Spielberg."

"Well then you'll just have to become Spielberg," I said. "To start, you can make _Grease_ the best damn musical McKinley's ever seen. Then apply to some film schools, get in, and thrive."

Artie smiled a little. "That's all I really can do. Sorry if I'm brooding. I'm usually pretty good at not talking about this stuff."

"It's no problem, Artie. I'm glad you opened up," I reassured him.

We listened to the rest of the song in silence and then he sang along to the next one. I joined him.

"You have a great voice, Sam," Artie said as _Creep_ played quietly in the background. "Why aren't you in Glee again?"

"Don't even try it," I said.

"It's inevitable," Artie replied. "The musical is a gateway drug."

Monday came fast. I left Artie's house after he assured me he'd be okay, and though I didn't believe him, there wasn't much I could do about it. I prayed for him on Sunday. My family hadn't really been to church since Sawyer's death. We just stopped going, and as a kid, I didn't mind. We went to an old people's church, and I'd usually fall asleep. As I got older, I thought about it more, and sometimes it bothered me. Since moving to Lima, I hadn't gone to church at all, but I still thought about God, and I felt like God really listened to my prayers on Sundays, so I sent one up for Artie.

Classes were easier now that I was less stressed, and I aced a pop quiz. People were giving me approving looks all day, and I was basking in the glow of it all. A few of the football players and Cheerios joined me during lunch and told me about some upcoming parties that I should definitely attend. Kitty, Phil, and Bobby were among them. I nodded and smiled even when they made a few off-color jokes about the new lunch lady. A brunette girl at the other table gave us all a dirty look. I averted my eyes.

Quinn found me in the hallway after the final bell rang as I gathered books from my locker. She poked me in the side and smiled when I looked up.

"Hi," she said.

"Hi." I returned her smile. Her cheeks were flushed, and she sniffled.

"I have Cheerios practice in a few minutes, and I know that you have football practice, but I said that I'd see you today, so here I am." She gripped her books to her chest and rocked back and forth on her heels.

"Here you are," I repeated, smiling, and she leaned towards me waiting for me to say something else. "Sorry," I said sheepishly. "You kind of caught me off guard."

"How about you walk me to practice?" She offered.

I gathered my things quickly and shut my locker. "So I didn't see you at lunch," I said as we made our way down the hall.

She shook her head. "I don't really hang out with the other Cheerios or many of the jocks. I go to parties sometimes, but they're not really into what I'm into. Half of them are idiots who think it's funny to bully other people, and I just don't find it all that amusing." She shrugged.

"I know. I sat with them at lunch, and they were making fun of the lunch lady, and it was just kind of sad and awkward." I looked down at my shoes as we walked. "But I couldn't say anything about it."

Quinn smirked. "Why not?"

"I don't know," I admitted. "I guess it's kind of hard when you're trying to fit in with the people who are doing it. I'm not the one making the jokes, at least."

"But you laugh at them."It was a statement, not a question.

"What else am I supposed to do? You know how hard it is." These were excuses, and I knew it, but saying them out loud made me feel foolish.

"Do you like philosophy?" Quinn asked.

"I guess. What does that have to do with this?"

"In 1946, Jean-Paul Sartre gave a lecture called 'Existentialism Is a Humanism' in which he defended existentialism against its many reproaches. The most famous thing he said in it is 'You give away with one hand what you pretend to gain with the other… To say that it does not matter what you choose is not correct. In one sense choice is possible, but what is not possible is not to choose. I can always choose, but I must know that if I do not choose, that is still a choice.' Though you've probably only heard the shorter form, 'Not choosing is still a choice,'" she said.

I knew what she meant, and I felt as ashamed as I should have during lunch time.

"What kind of jokes do you like to tell, Sam?" Quinn asked.

"Honestly, I'm not that great at telling jokes, so I try impressions," I replied.

"Well you'll have to do one for me sometime," Quinn said. We were at the football field now, and most of the other Cheerios were already out there, even Brady, the girl with the neck brace. Tina was chatting with Blaine, a guy who was also in Glee. I thought about asking her how things went with Artie, but maybe they hadn't turned out like he wanted them to. He didn't mention their hang out when I went to see him, and if anything good had happened, he'd at least have said something.

"Alright, alright," I said in my best Matthew McConaughey voice.

Quinn smiled. "Practice ends early Wednesday. We can meet at the Lima Bean around six."

"Yeah. That sounds great," I replied. "I'll see you then."

"Try not to get too distracted during practice, Sam." She poked me in the side again and made her way to the Cheerios. Coach Sylvester was shouting into a megaphone about passing kidney stones, and I shuddered with the thought.

I watched Quinn until she disappeared into the rest of the Cheerios and they began working on a routine. They moved together seamlessly, and the only distinguishable features from this view were their hair and skin. That was the purpose, I guess. From here it didn't matter that Quinn wasn't like most of the other Cheerios. It didn't matter that she was a sheep in wolves' clothing. Unless you got close enough to see that her fangs were removed, there was no way to tell the difference. And at the end of the day most people would treat her just the same because they were frightened at the possibility of her power. It was the same for me. I thought about this as I hustled around the field in my uniform. I was a part of the football team, and to most students at this school that meant one thing. It was up to me to define myself, to learn whether I was a sheep in wolves' clothing or not.

* * *

AN: This chapter is titled "Kids or Walking With A Ghost" based on the songs by MGMT and Tegan and Sara respectively.

The story also features Revelry by Kings of Leon, Mr. Brightside by The Killers, Every Little Thing She Does (No Such Thing) by John Mayer, and Creep by Radiohead. Any time the characters listen to a song, it reflects their current mood. It's the same way I use song titles for chapter titles. If you read the song lyrics, it pretty much outlines the basic theme of the chapter.

Whew! That was long! I'm not planning on any other chapter being quite so long (fingers crossed), but you never know. Can you believe it was just four days?! It was that damn football game (which was completely borrowed from Clockgate...I can't write football on my own...lol)! As I said in the beginning, please don't hate me for Quinn. Most of this story is actually all outlined and the backgrounds of the characters have already been pretty much solidified. Of all the possible high school girlfriends that Sam could have, Quinn and her canon story fit the best with the additional storyline. This Sam needs a Quinn in order to fully appreciate and ultimately fall for Mercedes in the end. And because of her canon background, I chose to retcon her age. Sorry. I won't blame you for giving up on Shiver now, but know that you'll be missed.

Thanks for sticking with me so far. It's only mid-September, and there's plenty of school year left.


	4. Little Lion Man, This Place Is A Prison

AN: The full chapter title is _Little Lion Man (Caring Is Creepy) or This Place Is a Prison_ but it wouldn't all fit so I shortened it and used a comma in place of 'or'.

* * *

I find it interesting how quickly life can change and how your perception of your own self worth is affected by that change. High school is particularly notorious for determining what the flavor is that month and when it's time to pull the rug from under someone's feet. For now, I was on everyone's radar, and I would be until the day I fucked up or basketball season began, whichever came first. Football season was now well underway, and we were undefeated. Sportscasters chalked it up to my leadership skills and ability to stay cool under pressure, but I tried not to lose sight of my team. It would have been easy for me to take all of the credit, but I knew that without them, and the status that that afforded me, I was worthless.

I struggled to conform because the pressure to be on top didn't really exist at PA, and I was All-State not just because I had something to prove. I genuinely loved playing football, but I was more than just a football player. I read comics and did impersonations and played guitar, and I wasn't alone. One of the most popular kids there LARPed in his free time. But at McKinley you were pigeonholed into a category and defined by how well you performed. Status was everything, and as the quarterback, I was the definitive measure. I would like to say that it was hard to be like everyone else, but that would be a lie. Quinn made it look easy to be at the top without being owned by it, but she'd had a lot more practice than me.

Quinn had had a baby when she was only fifteen. She was young and insecure and looking for love. Her boyfriend's best friend told her he loved her with a wine cooler in one hand and an old condom in the other. He fed her compliments and alcohol, and she gave him her virginity because he made her feel pretty. He didn't tell her when the condom broke, and she was unprepared when her period stopped coming. Her boyfriend abandoned her, her friends shunned her, and her parents failed her. She gave her little girl away to someone who could love her better, and Quinn began the slow process of learning how to love herself. But she didn't take care of herself well enough sometimes. She cut where the scars would be hidden beneath clothing and gave herself to travelers before she met me. She'd go for days without eating and kept small vials of blow and skag at the ready, but she had never felt closer to God.

She always noted how similar we were. "I used to be like you," she said one day.

"And how is that?" I asked.

We were working over coffee at The Lima Bean. I was finishing my second draft on my _Macbeth_ paper while she read _Thus Spoke Zarathustra, _having finished her own homework within ten minutes of us sitting down.

"I wanted it all. The status. The adoration. The acknowledgement that I was the best and that what I was doing was right." She stared at me as she sipped her drink. She always ordered her coffee black. She said that it was more honest that way. "But we're different, too."

"How so?" I asked.

"Because I wasn't afraid to admit it."

She was right. I tried not to want those things, but I couldn't deny that it felt good being on top, even if I didn't say it. I continued to sit with the jocks at lunch and smiled politely when they made mean comments, and I told myself that as long as I wasn't making them that it didn't count. I wasn't losing myself. I worked on the musical and had even gotten a few other players to join in as extras, and I learned that Ryder was the male lead. The Glee kids who were involved didn't hold it against me that I didn't join their club and made me feel wanted even though they were on the bottom. They were becoming familiar to me, and I started to see them as more than just Artie's friends. I wasn't losing myself.

But when Phil, Bobby, and a few other players threw slushies in their faces, I didn't intervene. When they attempted to jump this kid named Jake in the cafeteria, I didn't move to stop them. I told myself that I could turn a blind eye because my status would eventually protect them, but those things happened gradually. The Glee kids never blamed me for what happened. There was no blood on my hands. Artie told me that it had been going on for as long as he could remember.

"It's The Law of the Jungle, yo. Rudyard Kipling style," he shrugged. "We were on top for a while two years ago when we won Nationals."

"The Glee Club won Nationals?" I asked. I quickly pressed buttons on my controller and blew the head off of two zombies. Playing video games in Artie's room was quickly becoming one of my favorite things to do.

"Yeah, and it was awesome until Marley passed out on stage last year during our first competition. We all left the stage to help her out, and they counted that as us forfeiting." I could see that that still left a sour taste in his mouth.

"Wow, that's pretty messed up," I said.

"Kitty was encouraging her to starve herself. We kicked her out after, and she was hella mad. That's why she leads the pack in her hatred of us. Quinn, Tina, and Blaine help to keep her at bay, though," Artie said with a smug smile. "And before you ask, Tina's dating Mike. I know you wanted to know." His player was taken down by the zombie horde.

"Really?" My player died, and I put my controller down, leaning back in the chair and glancing at him.

"She told me that night that we beat Lincoln," he shrugged. "But that's okay."

"Are you alright, man? I mean if I had known," I began but Artie cut me off.

"It's fine. I kind of knew it, but I still tried, you know. Just in case." He put his controller down and backed away from his desk. "Are you hungry? My mom made kabobs."

Most of the time, Artie was a master at keeping on the sunny side. He didn't let his emotions negatively affect his work. He poured his sorrow into his art, letting it inspire him to create more insightful things. He'd given in that Saturday that I first came to his house but since then had made a plan and refused to become bitter. He'd been dressing a lot better in the last few weeks, and he told me that Mercedes had taken him shopping to give him a new outlook.

Mercedes liked to take care of people. You could hear it in the way she spoke and see it in her eyes when she looked at you. I suspected this is why she had such a large network of friends. I had met a few of them, some of whom were her co-workers, while visiting her at the store, and whenever I tried to hang out with her outside of the store, she always had plans. But she'd made time to come to a game like she promised and waited patiently afterwards to congratulate me. And she was already planning to see the musical.

I was visiting her regularly now, at least once or twice a week if just for five minutes. I found that speaking with her helped me to clear my head. She'd pick up right where we left off as if we'd never stopped talking. In truth, I didn't speak much after that first day, but she had enough vocabulary for the both of us.

"Did you go to college?" I asked her one day. We were itemizing new boxes of records, and I was attempting to dissect the last sentence she'd said.

She hesitated a moment. "I went to UCLA for a year, but it didn't work out," she said finally. "I'd be in my junior year right now, but what can I say? Plans change."

She resumed cataloging, but I was not letting it go that easily this time. She knew just about everything about me, but we didn't often talk about her life. "So that's your grand escape story? You flunked out and now you're back in Lima."

Mercedes finished itemizing the last few pieces and closed the box before looking up at me. "No," she said. "I was actually on the Dean's list when I quit."

"Then enlighten me. Isn't a college degree important to you? I'm going to live the fucking American Dream someday, Mercedes." I knew that I was being harsh and that I was probably way off the mark, but I pushed it anyways. She sighed and reached for the next box, and I grabbed her hand to stop her. "Enlighten me."

Mercedes pulled her hand from mine and stared into my eyes. "There're so many ways to live, Sam. I own my own house and don't owe another dime on it. How many 19 year-olds can say that? I'm a good Christian, and I'm adopting a dog next week. I've been in love with a boy who loved me back. It didn't ultimately work out, but that's okay, too. I have a wonderful job that pays my bills and good friends who visit me from time to time just to chat." She smiled a little. "I dropped out of college," she shrugged. "So if this isn't a dream just because of that one thing, then everyone else must be fucked because it can only get worse after this."

There is a point in every relationship when things start to move towards equilibrium. Conversations are no longer one-sided, and you begin to take care of one another. Things were shifting between Mercedes and me. We didn't often talk about her life, but in one fell swoop she revealed more about herself than she had ever told me. She was no longer back in Lima by circumstance. Something had caused her to leave a good life in LA, and at that moment I think she realized that someday she would tell me about it. She was fighting to keep looking at me now so I backed off.

"Everyone's not you, Mercedes," I said gently. "It is much worse after this."

"Yeah, I know," she replied, turning away. "I think that's enough chatting for one day, Sam."

Artie piled a few kabobs on two plates and slid one over to me. "I know that clothes don't make the man, but I think it was past time for a change," he said. "Mom and Joanna seem happier about it, too. Dad, on the other hand, doesn't really care one way or the other."

He laughed a bit, and I smiled. Joanna was chattering away on the phone when we entered the kitchen. Artie shooed her, and she left reluctantly after greeting me, the fabric of her dress bouncing as she moved. It was definitely too short for the weather.

"You know your mom probably thinks that I had something to do with it. The first time I came over she tried planting a seed so that I would tell you to buy new clothes," I laughed.

Artie shook his head. "That woman has literally talked to every friend that she's met about it, but she was right. I do feel more confident."

"Confident enough to get out and make a new lady friend?" I wagged my eyebrows at Artie and he shook his head again.

"No. I think I'm just going to lay low for a bit and see if life eventually throws me a bone. I'm still not really over Tina yet," he admitted and I nodded. "What about you? How are things going with Quinn?"

"Really well, actually," I grinned. I tried not to rub my relationship with Quinn in his face when his love life was so fucked, but I couldn't hold it in all the time. "We've been hanging out a lot, and she's just a really honest person. She's not like the other girls at school, and I like that."

"Good. Treat her right. She's been through a lot, and she deserves good things," Artie said.

I didn't know all of Quinn's history, but I was certain that she would reveal more of herself to me in time. I learned from what she had told me and used it to show her that I cared. I always offered her half of my meal even if I knew she wouldn't take it, and I read up on philosophy and listened to obscure bands in an attempt to impress her. I'm not really sure if it worked, but she smiled at my effort and kissed me. She was never shy about showing me around to her friends and introduced me as her sometimes boyfriend.

I stuck with her at parties where we'd always claim a corner and turn it into our own sanctuary among the wreckage. Bodies intertwined with each other. Rockets shot from the roof exploding behind trees. The night sky turned as bright as daylight and stars burst behind my eyes. Her mouth was set with sex appeal as she slipped me something to help me turn on, tune in, and cop out while she lost herself on skag. She felt thinner in my arms as she whispered lullabies of Jackie O and Johnny Cash, and _Pursuit of Happiness_ was the soundtrack to the motion picture of our lives. But we were not made for television. A phony and a drug-addicted anorexic.

Apologies. I had something of a pain in my head when I awoke. It was a few hours after I'd set my alarm clock to go off, and I groaned, dragging myself out of bed and into a cold shower. Quinn had given me a carefully measured cocktail of LSD and E last night, and the entire experience was somewhat surreal. There was a lengthy period in which I traced the lines on her palm, admiring the intricacies of the human hand and how God had made us with purpose down to our fingertips. The whole night was spent on fast-forward with pictures of pigs shooting down flowers on instant replay. I felt connected to the whole world then. I wasn't losing myself. There was no blood on my hands.

I was riding on a natural high when I went to see Mercedes that afternoon. I hadn't been by the store since last week when she'd finally begun opening up to me right before asking me to leave. She broke into a smile and gave me a hug when she saw me. She was wearing an all black number with a black silk scarf covered in silky gold chains and her smile was as radiant as ever.

"What are you doing here today?" She asked, beaming. "It's a Saturday. We've never convened and conversed on a Saturday."

I picked up a yellow-papered 78 on a table a few feet away and glanced inside. It was Bob Marley's _Redemption Song_. "I just really wanted to see you today, and I was hoping I'd find you here."

She smiled wider if that was possible and motioned for me to hand over the record so that she could put it away. Our fingers brushed as I passed it to her and it sent sparks through my hand. Perhaps I was still high. Everything was so vivid last night. My senses were all on high alert and every touch was the most intimate thing in the world. "Well that's sweet of you, Sam," she said.

"Actually I wanted to apologize for being rude to you last week," I confessed. "I've done a lot of thinking in the past week, and friends don't talk to friends the way I talked to you. I'm sorry."

"Thank you," she said. "But your prodding was justified. I know I tend to clam up about myself whenever you ask." She knotted her hands together for a moment before dropping them to her side. "But we're friends now, and you've trusted me with a lot of you, so I should start doing the same." She lowered her eyes but kept her smile.

I put my hand on her shoulder. "You don't owe me anything, Mercedes," I reassured her, and she looked back up.

"I know, but I want to open up to you, Sam. I like being honest, and that starts with trust," she said.

We stared at each other like fools, like we were seeing the other for the first time. When I first met Mercedes Jones, I had promised myself to never purposely meet her again, but fate is a tricky bastard sometimes and definitely knows what we need better than we do.

I awkwardly removed my hand from her shoulder and made my way to the vintage section while she grabbed a ladder from the back and began cleaning some of the shelves above the back wall. "So did you ever adopt a dog?" I asked, attempting to banish some of the awkward tension that had formed.

"I forgot I mentioned that. Yeah!" She exclaimed. "His name is Lennon, just like the singer. He's huge and ugly as sin and they told me that he'd been abused as a puppy. But he has the sweetest soul. He was a day away from being euthanized when I took him. They said they couldn't control him, but he turned into putty when he saw me. I'm glad, you know? Because everything deserves a chance to grow and change."

I nodded. I was going through my own period of growth and figuring out the type of person that I wanted to be and wanted to share with others. "Well maybe he'll take a liking to me, too. Perhaps I could come by and meet him sometime. Later today even," I suggested. "Lennon seems to be a good judge of character, and it would be interesting to see him judge me."

Mercedes hadn't stopped cleaning the shelves, but she wasn't looking at me now. Maybe I was being too forward and moving too fast. She'd only agreed to start opening up less than ten minutes ago. "Okay," she said.

"Okay?" I repeated.

"Yeah, okay," she replied, more firmly this time. "But you have to bring something when you come."

"Anything," I replied without waiting to find out what.

"I stripped the last few feet of my backyard earlier this week so that I could make a garden. I know that I can't plant much right now, but there are a few winter plants that will make it look homier in the coming season." Her chestnut eyes shone as I watched her.

"So you want me to buy you some plants?" I confirmed.

She nodded. "Someday, it'll all be covered with potatoes and sunflowers, just in case Jonfen comes looking." She thought allusions to her favorite books were the wittiest things she said. She was constantly missing out on the best parts of herself.

"Okay. Where do you live? I'll be there around six."

"Trachimbrod," she replied with a smile, "also known as Sofiowka, but I have the only map." She climbed down the ladder and leaned against the table beside me.

"Seriously, Mercedes," I said.

"I'm only ten blocks away. Pick a direction."

If she really wanted to be difficult, I could play along. I could be more ridiculous. "I guess that would depend on if you practice feng shui."

She smiled and pushed my shoulder. "You are so full of shit. I live in a big, gray house off of Prince Street with a big backyard and a freshly laid garden." I nodded and stared her down until she gave me the address. "You know we're serious now," she said.

"I know."

It didn't take me long to find a nursery around town, but it took a while to pick out just the right plants. Mercedes didn't seem very picky about gifts, but I wanted to impress her with my selection. The back and front seats of my mom's Toyota were filled as I neared the big, gray house. I could hear Lennon barking out back while Mercedes clapped and cheered him on. The side gate was unlocked, so I let myself in.

"I have come bearing donations, my fair lady," I announced as I came into full view.

She had her back to me, but I could feel her smiling. Lennon's tail wagged excitedly as he ran up to me and jumped up to greet me, his large paws nearly knocking the plants out of my arms. Mercedes had turned and was watching us quietly. "He likes you," she said.

"You were right, though," I replied. "He is one ugly dog." She laughed and called him over, running her hands through his shaggy fur. "Where do you want these?" I asked.

She glanced back over to me, "Now is the time for feng shui."

The rain was falling, tides were turning, and poets were dreaming. The leaves changed, and seeds rooted into cold, unforgiving ground. The stars gleamed, the earth turned, and I made my choices day by day. I was on top, and I was falling in love with all of the people around me. The Glee kids were my friends, too, and a few of the football players in Glee and I convinced the jocks to leave them alone. But the alliance between them was weak. It was like Game of Thrones. Winter was coming, and it wouldn't take much for them to get smacked down to the bottom again. But for now, there was peace.

I had to admit that I was having fun working on the musical, and watching the genuine friendships of the Glee kids was affecting me. There were both football players and Cheerios in Glee. I was a decent singer, and if they could do it why couldn't I? Artie scheduled my tryout, and I stood in front of my friends with Peggy strapped across my chest to slow my beating heart.

I looked around at their faces, and I settled on Quinn who was smiling bigger than I'd ever seen before, and I began a rendition of _No Woman, No Cry_. I closed my eyes and sang to Quinn and her struggle to be loved and to my role in all of that. But I also sang to Mercedes who was learning to trust me even though it seemed hard. And when the last note had faded, the choir room erupted, and my friends gathered around me, pulling me in, giving me a place among them.

I was happier, and I couldn't deny that. Everyone around me noticed it. I could see it on my face when I studied myself in the mirror. Happiness was all but thrust upon me the moment Ryder caught my ball in the end zone, and I knew that it was genuine when Lima began to feel like home. But this happiness could come at a price. My friends and parents taught me that, and I was doing all that I could to not lose myself along the way. High school can be a scary place, but I was sifting through the wreckage and cleaning every damned spot. I was finding myself.

* * *

AN: This chapter is titled _Little Lion Man (Caring Is Creepy) or This Place Is a Prison_ based on the songs by Mumford and Sons, The Shins, and The Postal Service, respectively.

Other songs featured in this chapter include _Pursuit of Happiness_ by Kid Cudi and _Redemption Song_ and _No Woman, No Cry_ both by Bob Marley.

Pop culture referenced in this chapter includes _Macbeth_ by Shakespeare, _Thus Spoke Zarathustra_ by Friedrich Nietzsche, _The Law of the Jungle_ by Rudyard Kipling, _The Revolution Will Not Be Televised_ by Gil Scott-Heron, _Rent_ by Jonathan Larson, _Everything Is Illuminated_ by Jonathan Safran Foer, and _A Clockwork Orange_ by Anthony Burgess.

So I think I'm getting a groove. Maybe. This chapter is less brooding and more introspective methinks, and it's my favorite so far. Anyways, I hope you're enjoying reading this as much as I enjoy writing it. And as always please feel free to comment and critique.


	5. Tiny Vessels or I've Been Eating For You

I've been thinking a lot about Emma lately. I'm not entirely sure why she came to mind, but the minute she popped into my thoughts a few weeks ago, she buried herself there and refused to leave. We dated freshman through junior year, and the whole time I was uncertain where I stood with her. I can still see her on my last day in Tennessee. The sun was beginning to come up, reflecting the light brown streaks in her hair, and it was quieter than it should have been. I don't know. Maybe it was something in that moment. She was wearing an orange camp t-shirt from her summer job, and she smelled like pine needles. She intertwined our fingers and held me close, whispering so that my parents wouldn't hear.

"Can I tell you something?" I whispered back, and suddenly I'm telling her everything I wanted to say over the last three years. How nervous I was first meeting her, how good she felt falling asleep in my arms, my frustrations that she was saving herself for marriage. It all comes out of me, and it keeps coming, and at some point I regrettably used the word 'destiny.' I don't remember in what context. It doesn't really matter.

"Try not to forget me," she said. "I-I love you. I should've told you that a long time ago."

She'd caught me off guard. I knew what my response should have been, but I kissed her instead to lengthen the time where we lived in a world where I hadn't said "yes" or "no" yet. I pulled away and there was no expression on her face. She was waiting.

"I love you, too," I muttered quickly.

She hugged me a little too long and tried to hide her tears at first. As our car pulled away, however, she gave into her sadness. I remember breathing a sigh of relief and turning away as she grew smaller in the back windshield. Mom was giving me the eye so I pretended to be asleep, and before long I was. I woke up, and the car wasn't moving anymore. We were parked outside of our new house. Dad was shaking my shoulder and saying, "Welcome home." My time in Tennessee was over, so was summer, even though there were still two weeks before school began.

When I finally checked my phone, I had a text from one of our mutual friends, Cache, chastising me for telling Emma that I loved her. At the end of the text he wrote, "Seriously, though? Destiny?! LOL!"

This isn't about how girls are evil or how love is bad; this is about how I learned something. I don't know if it's true or not, but it's what I learned. I told Emma something, and it was just for her, and she told everybody. So I learned to cut out the middle man and make it for everybody always. Everybody can't turn around and tell everybody: everybody already knows; I told them. I wish I could say that this was about how I started that love affair a boy and ended it a man, more cynical, hardened, and mature and shit. But that's not true. The truth is I cared about Emma like a boy and I never learned to love as a man. I still haven't.

Even being as cynical as I was about love, I found it easy to see when other people were starting to fall. Lately when we hung out, Artie couldn't stop smiling. He'd hit it off with Sugar after working with her on _Grease_. It was as much of a surprise to him as it was to her because he'd tried to date her a few years ago, and she'd denied him then. At some point, among the twinkle of fairy lights in Sugar's basement at the _Grease_ after party, she kissed Artie. It had only been a few weeks, but they already had that look that lovers get. I didn't know if I was capable of looking at any woman the way that Artie looked at Sugar. If I was being honest with myself, it scared me to think about falling for Quinn. She was beautiful, but she was broken, too, and that fragility scared the shit out of me.

Quinn had always been fragile, even before her real dad left and the afterbirth beat her into submission. She'd had a nose job by the time she was fourteen, and she purposely threw up her dinner for the first time when she was twelve. And she was still trying to pick up the pieces. Conor was a boy who used Quinn when she was lonely. He was the first boy to spike her drink the year after she had a kid and the first boy to say he loved her when she began to fall apart. He was a few years older than she was when they met at her first college party. She was scared the first time he pulled out a needle, but she learned to love the feeling of being infinite. Quinn let me watch her get high sometimes, though most of the time she did it in secret. I could see how open she was to the universe when something was pumping in her veins.

"Shut the door," she said, wrapping me in her arms, and I stretched an arm over and pushed it closed quietly.

We were in Quinn's bedroom, which was a splash of pale purple and eggshell white. _Something_ by The Beatles was playing softly on the stereo. She kissed me and pulled me towards her bed, and out of the corner of my eye, I could already see everything set up and waiting on her nightstand. I didn't know where she hid her stash from her parents, but she would have been in rehab by now if they knew.

The shuffling of my feet across the floor made me feel clumsy, but I stopped thinking about it when she pushed me down onto her bed. Everything in that moment was the drumbeat in my chest and the feel of Quinn's trembling fingers as she traced lines across my skin. We were alone in the house and for a second I wondered where her parents were, but she removed that thought with another kiss.

"Get on the bed properly," she instructed, removing her shoes and straddling me for a moment before crawling to the other side. She'd fitted the leather strap around her arm by the time I shaped my body to hers, and she handed me a wet cotton ball. "For after." It smelled like alcohol.

"This is love," she said, tapping the side of the needle. She was taunting me. We were in the recovery stage of our latest fight in which I'd told her that getting high meant that she didn't love herself enough. '_At least I respect myself enough to be real,'_ she'd replied and walked away, but she'd forgiven me somehow. Otherwise she wouldn't have invited me here. "_Addicere_: to give over, dedicate, surrender. 'Reason lost the battle, and all I could do was surrender and accept I was in love.'" She was sweating and struggling to take deeper breaths, and her whole body shivered as she kissed me slowly for a moment. She tried to pull away, and I held her there.

"You don't have to do this anymore," I whispered against her lips. She smiled against me and kissed me again.

I didn't stop her that time, but I didn't watch either. Instead, I pressed my mouth to her neck and slid my hand down her body, seeking out the warmest parts of her. She gasped at the contact or something. I licked my lips and was certain that she'd bruise. I could tell when she was finished because her body stopped shaking and she leaned into me.

She fingered the spot of my injection. I almost broke the skin. She reached for the cotton ball, and I placed it delicately in her palm. Then she cleaned herself up.

"This…is love," she whispered again, and she gripped my arm trying to get me to understand, but I couldn't, and it killed me.

I looked into her eyes, and she was steady. Her hair stuck to her forehead, and I moved it out of the way and tucked it behind her ears. She was shaking again, breathing fast, but this time I was giving her a fix. She raked her fingernails across my arm, rocking back slowly, and I wondered how it felt when she went over the edge.

She rested her head on my shoulder, breathing in slower, more controlled. She was cold and through her clothing I could feel how small she was. "Eat something," I said, and she met my eyes for a moment. "Please."

I was begging, and I knew it, but to me _this_ was love. I can't lose her. "For you," she murmured.

She was escaping to a place where I couldn't reach her, so I shook her, and her eyes opened slowly. "Don't go to sleep yet. You have to eat something."

"You're on a diet," she said accusingly, and I nodded in agreement. I was probably the next closest thing to being right where she is, but I don't starve myself, and I said this to her.

She nodded and began to drag herself up. I helped her. There was leftover chicken salad in the fridge, and I made her a sandwich. She took slow, deliberate bites, and I wondered where her parents were. I couldn't force her to give up drugs, but she was eating, and that's what mattered.

Quinn's addiction was somehow nonexistent at school. She was tied for valedictorian with Tina and Artie, and the extra pep she got from a hit gave her more energy than the other Cheerios. She usually gave herself a booster during lunch time, but she'd been trying to participate and eat more. She walked a fine line between being a role model and a train wreck. But even though my heart beat faster whenever she looked at me, I found it difficult to move past the baggage I still held of my unfulfilled relationship with Emma.

Or maybe it was something else entirely.

My parents had been arguing more often since Mom's slip up with calling me Sawyer. They'd head out to the garage a few times a week, and every morning after, Dad looked like he hadn't slept in years. I bit my tongue and didn't ask about the trouble, but it was seeping into the house, and Stevie was starting to act out in school. I did my big brother duty, and it helped some, but at the end of the day, Mom and Dad would have to get better to fix things properly.

I went to see Mercedes almost every day now, either at her house or at the store. Artie had called her my solace from the world, and I was starting to believe it. The last time I'd gone to her house, I met the elusive and much discussed Kurt. They were drinking tea in the kitchen when I arrived. I must admit that I wasn't quite sure what to make of Kurt when I saw him. He was about my height, thin, and wearing a women's sweater.

"Fashion has no gender," he boldly stated when he caught me eyeing it. He then gave me a Manhattan onceover, taking in every aspect of my outfit. "As for you." He made a circling gesture.

"What?"

"Just tell me." He zeroed in on my hair, and I shook my head to which he tsked. "Maybe where you come from you could get away with the whole I just stayed in the sun all summer excuse, but it's fall, and I have three gifts. My voice, my ability to spot trends in men's fashion, and my ability to know when it comes from a bottle."

Mercedes giggled, and I shot her a look. "I don't dye my hair, dude."

"Yes you do," Kurt asserted. "But it's just between friends. That's not natural."

"Whatever," I said. How the hell did he figure that out? I'd actually put a lemon juice rinse in my hair to brighten it up just a bit, but I would never admit it. Not now.

I tuned out as Kurt and Mercedes began chatting away about Kurt's new designs. Kurt had always been into fashion, but he'd only recently begun pursuing it. He ran an online store (" ," he said. "Look it up.") that had grown in popularity over the last few months. One of his custom bowties had been worn by the host of Trevor Live, and people were starting to take notice. He was one of those people that had gotten trapped in Lima after high school, but he was making plans to get out.

"So Mercedes tells me that you can sing." When I looked up, Kurt was gazing thoughtfully at me across the kitchen island, and it kind of freaked me out.

"Uh, yeah," I replied, inching my stool a bit closer to Mercedes.

"Well then why have I never seen you at Bright Night?" Kurt asked accusingly.

"Bright Night?" I raised a brow.

"It's an open mic night at BreadStiX on the second Thursday of the month," Mercedes explained. "You can recite poetry, sing original music, or do a cover. People even dance sometimes. It's pretty chill."

"Are you going to sing?" I'd been dying to hear Mercedes sing. All she ever did was hum.

"Perhaps." She gave a mischievous smile.

Kurt tsked again and turned to Mercedes. "You can't hog all of the cute ones, Mercy. Tell that boy you plan to sing so that he actually comes. Do it for me, at least."

"What?" This conversation definitely veered down a path I wasn't prepared to go.

Mercedes was smiling and shaking her head. "Sam is not gay, Kurt."

Kurt gave me another onceover and crossed his arms. "Okay, maybe my instincts were off, but he's definitely not narrow."

I shrugged my shoulders. "I went to an all-boys boarding school."

"Really?"

"What?"

Kurt and Mercedes spoke at the same time. Kurt's eyes sparkled while Mercedes looked slightly confused.

"I had a girlfriend," I quickly explained, scooting my stool out a bit. "But being around dudes all the time can sometimes make you feel gay for the stay. I never did anything with anybody, though." I somehow didn't feel awkward admitting this.

Kurt wore a satisfied smirk and sat down in the opposite stool. Lennon bounded up beside him and began whining to be petted. Kurt obliged. "Well, then. You have to come to Bright Night. It's next Thursday. Maybe we can sing a duet," Kurt offered. "No pressure, though."

I pressed my lips together and glanced at Mercedes who was looking at Kurt with an amused expression. "Well that sounds fun, but I don't know about the duet." Kurt's smirk faded a bit. "Not that I wouldn't do it," I quickly added, "but it'll be my first time. I'll probably just watch everyone."

"Maybe you can bring Quinn, Sam," Mercedes suggested, and I smiled gratefully.

"Quinn Fabray?" Kurt's eyes were wide.

"Yes, Kurt," Mercedes smiled. "Quinn is Sam's girlfriend."

Kurt wanted to know every detail about how Quinn was these days, and I gave the most basic answers I could. I hadn't even talked much about her to Mercedes, and I was unsure about how much of her drug use was public knowledge.

"Well you seem like a pretty honorable guy, Sam," Kurt said patting me on the shoulder. "Please bring Quinn. It'd be nice to catch up with her again."

"I'll ask her," I said.

"And maybe you can convince Mercedes here," Kurt said, turning to her, "to let me bring my friend Anthony along."

Mercedes was shaking her head violently. "Absolutely not!"

I sat up straighter. "Who's Anthony?" I asked quickly. My stomach knotted up a bit, but I took a sip of tea release it.

"Anthony Rashad is only the cutest Poli-Sci major this side of the Mississippi," Kurt explained.

Mercedes rolled her eyes. "Kurt has been trying to set me up with Anthony since high school. We went on one date, which ended badly," she said pointedly to Kurt. "But he keeps trying."

"You two are different people than you were in high school," Kurt countered. "You should give him another chance."

"No," Mercedes said.

"I forgot. Mercedes swore off of love since leaving LA. It's a shame, really, because I'm always beating guys off with very chic sticks over her." Kurt wrapped his arms around Mercedes and she slapped his hand playfully.

"So you dated in LA?" I couldn't resist asking. I crossed my arms and drummed a little on the counter.

"Yes," she replied, and her smile dropped a little. Kurt released her and went to refill the kettle.

"Does anybody want more tea?" Kurt interjected.

"Yes."

"Yeah."

Mercedes and I spoke over each other as we both considered her love life for a moment. She gave me a small smile and excused herself to the bathroom. I watched as she left, but she refused to exude sadness as she went, even though I knew that Kurt had accidentally opened some old wounds.

Kurt sighed. "I need to learn to shut the hell up sometimes."

"What happened in LA?" I probably shouldn't have prodded, but Kurt had opened this floodgate, and it would kill me not knowing.

He paused a moment, considering, then turned around to face me. "Mercedes had a really good life out there. She was thriving, you know? But when you leave a good place, you have to leave a lot of good things behind." He checked the water. "Can you turn this off when it boils? I'll be back." He went off in the same direction she'd gone, leaving me with Lennon.

I could definitely understand the feeling of leaving behind everything that you think is good for you, but I was starting to see the good in coming to Lima. If my family hadn't moved here, then I would still be with Emma, and I wouldn't have met Quinn or Mercedes. The tea kettle whistled, and I thought, _Yeah. Me, too._

In addition to increased visits with Mercedes, I absorbed myself in every escape that I could find. I got high more often with Quinn. Nothing like she did, mostly LSD and E, but I was beginning to understand how I was wrong. How it could be a form of love. I was extra focused during football, and we were already going to the playoffs even though we still had a couple of games before the postseason began. I had solid As and Bs in all of my classes, and my tutoring relationship with Artie had turned into Artie needing to do nothing more than proofread my papers. Most of the time we just hung out, did our respective homework, and brainstormed ideas for Glee. Sectionals was coming up, and everyone was understandably nervous since Marley's fainting spell was just last year. I was nervous that Quinn would be the new Marley, but she was eating again. Even so, I was having dreams of falling.

I was Holden Caulfield standing in a field of rye, and I kept seeing my friends and family in the faces of the kids I had to catch. Mercedes, Quinn, Stacey, Artie, Stevie, Mom, Dad. I stand on the edge of a cliff, and every time they start to go over, I pull them back, and they all run in the other direction. But then I get distracted. Sawyer's to my right, and he's picking up a little kid who'd fallen into the rye. The kid has a busted knee, and his dirty blonde hair is dusty from the fall. I don't know who he is, but he looks vaguely familiar. This feels too intimate too watch, however, and I turn away from the sight. Too quickly, though, and I lose my footing for a moment. I can see Sawyer look up just as I begin to fall, but when I go over the cliff there's no one there to catch me.

BreadStiX was transformed with a bit of dimmer lighting and a few decorations. Quinn held my hand as Sugar pushed Artie along beside us. I looked around a moment and spotted Kurt and Mercedes set up at a table near the front. Mercedes smiled as we came closer.

"I didn't know you were bringing Artie," Mercedes grinned and her eyes rested on Sugar's hand which was intertwined with Artie's. "And Sugar!" She hugged Artie and he smiled sheepishly.

"What's good, mama?" Artie said.

"I hope you don't mind," I said.

"Not at all! The more the merrier. Let me just round up another chair," She said with a quick glance around the room.

"I'll help," Sugar offered. She gave Artie a quick peck on the cheek before hurrying off to help Mercedes.

"Well have a seat!" Kurt waved us into the two empty chairs they'd already saved for Quinn and me, and we settled in. Quinn took off her jacket and fanned herself a bit. "It's good to see you guys! It's been way too long since we've hung out."

They chatted like old friends always do and caught up on each others' lives. Mercedes and Sugar came back quickly with a chair, and all at once I found myself on the outside again. In the months since moving to Lima, I'd carved out a pretty nice niche for myself. But time and time again when I wasn't expecting it, I received a reminder that I didn't quite fit in. I wasn't a bully like the jocks I hung out with at school. I wasn't nearly as much of a nerd as Artie. I didn't do any Class A drugs like Quinn. And the other Glee kids had years of stories they could tell. As for me? I had my impersonations.

"Are you okay?" Mercedes was whispering to me over the sound of the first act, a dancer named Marco McWilliams. I wasn't sure what he was trying to do, but I was about a hundred percent sure he was going to get some sort of brain damage. "Sorry about earlier. We can lose ourselves sometimes when we get together."

"No, it was fine," I assured her. I leaned one arm on the table and stretched out my fingers. I'd been sitting still and hadn't realized it. "I'm pretty used to it by now. I zone out half the time in the choir room. It's even worse there."

She sat back and watched Marco for a moment and then leaned in again. "I didn't get to ask you before, but how are things?" By the way she said it. I knew she was thinking of my parents.

I shook my head and glanced around. Artie and Sugar were cuddled up in front of us, Kurt looked mortified as he stared at Marco, and Quinn was gazing ahead, but I knew that she was listening. I hadn't told her about my family's problems yet.

Mercedes reached out and squeezed my hand briefly. "I'm sorry," she said softly.

"Thanks," I replied, balling my hand into a fist for a moment after she let go. It always felt like stars were slowly traveling through my skin when she touched me. Quinn's lips twitched in the corner of my vision, but she didn't move or say anything.

Kurt gasped. "He's going to kill himself, and that's a shame because he has really nice bone structure." Marco was now juggling knives. He dropped one, and it bounced off of the stage and onto the floor by the people the next table over.

"Or us," Artie said backing his chair up a bit.

"I'll be back," Kurt said. "I'm going to sign up. Does anybody else want me to put them down?"

Artie and Mercedes quickly nodded and handed Kurt pieces of paper with their songs.

"Sugar, Quinn, Sam?" Kurt asked.

"Yes," Quinn replied, and I looked over at her. Her cheeks were flushed, and there was something in her eyes but I couldn't say exactly what. She was rolling a piece of paper around in her hands. "There's a song I've been thinking about a lot lately." She gave a small smile and poked me in the side. "You should sing something, too."

"Come on, Sam!" Sugar egged.

"Yeah, okay," I replied and wrote a song down before handing it to Kurt. Quinn did the same. I was still staring at her trying to figure out her thoughts, and she laid her head on my shoulder.

"Get a room you two," Artie cracked, and I glared at him.

Kurt was an amazing performer. He was hitting all the notes on _Popular_, along with a few high kicks. He went on after these two girls who'd named themselves Abilisa. They were about as bottom of the barrel as you could get for talent, and, really, anyone who followed them would've looked amazing by comparison. But Kurt really was talented, and I was unsure why he hadn't yet escaped Lima for greener pastures. Artie followed him with Frank Ocean's _Thinkin' 'Bout You_ and had everyone feeling his love for Sugar. She beamed as Artie rolled up to her after he was finished, and she threw her arms around him and whispered things in his ear that caused him to blush.

"I'm going to the bathroom," Quinn whispered in my ear, and I could see the faraway look in her eyes. I nodded, and she kissed me on the cheek and squeezed my arm before leaving. Mercedes watched us quietly and smiled when Quinn glanced her way. The next act, a group of singers called Guevara, went up. They were singing _Falling Slowly_ by The Swell Season.

"Quinn looks good," Mercedes whispered as soon as she walked away.

"You think so?" I asked. I glanced over and Mercedes was staring me down.

"Yeah," she whispered. "Can I ask you something?"

"Sure, anything," I replied.

"Would you tell me if Quinn needed help?" I wasn't sure how much Mercedes knew about the demons Quinn faced, but I was certain that she wasn't as blind as everyone else seemed to be. "Quinn's my sister. She actually stayed with me when her parents kicked her out. She won't talk to me about much these days, but I'm worried about her."

"She's fine," I said even though I knew that she wouldn't believe me, but Quinn's battle was not mine to tell.

Mercedes nodded and looked forward again.

"Okay, next up we have Quinn Fabray, and it says here that her song is a surprise." The DJ cued up the song. "So I won't spoil it for you guys, but if this song is for you, you're in for a treat."

Quinn walked on from the side and sat on a stool in the middle of the stage. Kurt, Artie, Sugar, and Mercedes were cheering extra loud. I smiled but couldn't bring myself to say anything then. She was illuminated on the stage, and the light bounced off of her. I could see soft brown lowlights in her blonde hair. Her nose was red.

"My brother always wore long sleeves, too, even in the summertime," Mercedes said softly. She was still staring ahead towards Quinn and the short-sleeved shirt she was wearing on stage. "He was afraid someone would see and figure him out. But what he didn't know was that most people only see what they want to see."

Quinn had left her jacket on the chair next to me, and I quickly looked between it and Mercedes as the intro notes began to play. She nodded towards Quinn, and when I looked up, Quinn was staring straight at me, and she began to sing.

Emma couldn't sing worth shit, but a week after I'd been in Lima, she sent me a video of her singing Coldplay's _Green Eyes_ because she said it made her miss me. It had cheered me up then because I was in the beginning stages of brooding, but it was nothing like this. Quinn's singing voice was a light alto, and as pretty as it was, she hadn't sung anything with any real emotion since I'd known her. This was different. This sent cold shivers down my spine. The green of her eyes reflected mine as she looked past my surface level. She was the center of attention on that stage, but I was in the spotlight. I was her green eyes, and she was telling me that she needed me. Because I saw the beauty when she shot herself up. Because I cared whether or not she ate.

Mercedes reached out and squeezed my hand for just a second, and it broke my concentration and brought me back to where I was. I didn't have to look at her to know that she'd be staring straight ahead at Quinn. I also knew that she had meant it as a reassuring gesture to say that she was there with me and that she was glad that Quinn had me, but to me it felt like a betrayal. The room erupted into applause when Quinn finished, and Sugar was squeeing in front of me. Quinn made a beeline for me, and I stood to take her into my arms. Because I knew that I should. I held her close, and when we sat back down, she wrapped herself around me as if she could take care of me, too.

"Sam," Quinn said gently, and I met her eyes. She stared into mine, searching. I wasn't sure for what. "I think I lo—" She began.

I silenced her with a kiss. "Shh. Not here, but, yeah, me too," I said, and she nodded and laid against the back of my shoulder. I wasn't prepared for this kind of vulnerability.

The DJ called Mercedes' name, and she walked to the stage. The light seemed brighter as it shined off of the champagne-colored lines in her shirt. The crowd was cheering extra loud, and it wasn't just our little group. She had to be a regular.

"Thank you," she said with a smile. "I have two songs that I'm going to sing tonight, and they're both very personal to me." Mercedes bit her lip a bit and took a breath. She studied the faces around the room, taking in everyone. It was already quiet. "I lived in Los Angeles for a year when I graduated high school, and when I was there, I fell in love."

Her eyes stopped on me. She could keep this part to herself. I was selfish, and she didn't have to share this with me. "I've been back in Lima for the last year and some change, and at first I was bitter." She glanced down. "And sometimes it still makes me sad." She swallowed and looked back up. Back at me. "But I've been thinking lately about Maya Angelou, and I refuse to be broken. My first song is _A Long Walk_ by Jill Scott in honor of old love. But it's also to new beginnings."

I swallowed hard. I don't know why. She nodded to the DJ, and he cued up her song. I don't know what I expected Mercedes' voice to sound like, but I was more than blown away. It hung in the air like wind chimes, and something inside of me was longing for this to be more about her present than her past, more about her never turning me away when I went to see her, but she wasn't looking at me anymore. She was engaging the people behind me, to the side of me. Artie, Sugar, and Kurt were jamming along, but Quinn was holding me closer. She hadn't unwrapped her arms from around me, but now her hands felt like vice grips.

"My second song," she said with a sad smile to the crowd after the applause from _A Long Walk_ died down, "is _Caged Bird_ by Alicia Keys."

She didn't give it anymore of an introduction, and she wasn't looking at anyone now. Her eyes were closed as she relived her reasons for choosing this song.

"Oh Mercy," Kurt whispered in front of me, and his hands were all knots.

This time, her voice drifted to me from somewhere far away, from a past rooted in pain. I could almost see Mercedes broken, her shoulders falling down like teardrops. Withstanding nights of terror and fear. She was making herself unnecessarily vulnerable, and it put me in a cold sweat. And even though I had no reasons why, when she looked up and caught my eye, I thought, _So this is what it means to love Mercedes Jones_.

Her last notes hung in the air and all around me people were up on their feet giving her a standing ovation. She was smiling radiantly now and displaying none of the raw emotion that was eating me up inside just a moment ago. Kurt pulled her into a hug when she came back to the table, and Artie demanded that she also hug him.

"I didn't know that you could sing like that," I muttered when she settled back in next to me. "That was amazing."

"Thanks," she beamed. Her eyes twinkled, and she looked like the sun was rising on her. Or maybe she was the one rising.

"That was beautiful, Mercedes," Quinn said from over my shoulder. She was still holding me tightly, and I shifted to loosen her grip.

"Now that's going to be a hard act to follow! Miss Mercedes Jones has been slaying everybody for a few months now. So if you're coming up here, you better step your game up," the DJ announced. "Coming to the stage next is Sam Evans. Is Sam Evans still in the house?"

They don't tell you how the spotlight shines in your eyes. It's hard to tell from the audience, but I was secretly glad. Everyone was shrouded in shadow from this angle. I could still see them, but their smiles weren't so harsh or judging from here. But my stomach was still in my throat, and my nervousness had nothing to do with following Mercedes. When I picked up the acoustic guitar and began to play a stripped down version of Ryan Adams' _Wonderwall_, I didn't dare look at anybody because I was afraid that my eyes might betray me. I should be singing to Quinn like she had sang to me, but I couldn't be honest with myself and say that this was all for her. Because maybe we weren't made to be saved by one person.

I had an English teacher freshman year who liked to talk about the concept of having a soulmate. We read a crazy amount of love stories in the class from _Romeo and Juliet_ to _Jane Eyre_ and watched movies like _The English Patient_. He loved the Greek notion that Zeus was jealous of "double humans" who were born whole and happy, so he split them apart to spend their lives searching for their other half. He was obsessed with the idea that we were made to find our complement. Maybe it was because I was a teenage boy with hormones raging, but I always found that to be bullshit. Now, however, I wasn't quite so sure. People entered our lives and transformed us, and sometimes they gathered you up and spun you from straw to gold. I could see how both Mercedes and Quinn were changing me for the better, but they were doing it in different ways.

I cared about Quinn like any boyfriend would care about his girlfriend. She was smart and beautiful and was always pushing me to become better, but she belonged to the dark corners we shared during parties and the bed we shared when her parents weren't watching. Our relationship thrived on nights spent so high we barely made it home and all of the demons Quinn was constantly chasing away. Mercedes was teaching me how to live a more honorable life and that the demons that made you don't have to own or break you. She was open and honest even when it hurt her to reveal those parts of herself. Quinn soothed the part of me that wanted to belong somewhere, but when I was with Mercedes' I didn't have that need.

Whatever Quinn had begun to say earlier, she never finished. I took her home, and she hugged me goodnight and said she'd see me at school the next day. She looked like she had a million things to talk about, but she didn't, and I knew that she was upset. I didn't make her feel secure, however, because I was no longer sure that I could.

We demolished Tiverton in overtime at the football game the next night. Red swam in my vision, and all I could see were the battles we all were facing, and I destroyed every one of them. I beat them into submission.

"I want some of what you're having," I whispered as I held Quinn close at the after party. We were dancing to _Killer_ by The Plain White T's.

She shook her head. "What I have isn't good for you. Don't be like me." We weren't entirely comfortable. I could feel the sharp angles where her body was still learning to fill itself out again.

"But I want to be where you are. I can handle it." I was begging again, but it was my form of salvation because Quinn didn't deserve a guy who only half loved her.

"No," she said more firmly. She pushed me away and dug around in her pocket. "Here." She gave me two more hits of acid. "You don't need to fight my fight. I get it."

But I wasn't sure that she did.

I went wandering through the night shortly after. My body was itching for release. Lights escaped from my skin and guided me through the streets until every bone in my body ached for the comfort of home, but I refused to go. My phone was ringing every few minutes but I was so struck with the wonder of the night that I had stopped noticing two hours ago.

When Sawyer was 17, he dreamed of leaving a legacy like Alexander Supertramp but with less death and more spiritual awakening. He took down all of the pictures from his walls so that people who visited his room would notice the century old pine outside of his window. He read books on the origins of haiku and spent afternoons skinny dipping in a lake outside of town. It terrified our parents to think that he might disappear one day on a Thoreauvian journey, but I respected his decision even though I was too young to really understand it. There was a lot I didn't get about my brother, but he loved me like he loved the world, and that I could understand.

He shared this love with me sometimes. My brother was in love with sunrises. He would wake up early to watch them each morning. Sometimes when I couldn't sleep I would join him, and we would watch the night at its darkest before the sky burst into beautiful light. He felt like they were made to give him meaning as if everything God created was a metaphor. He'd clutch me close to his side and describe the light in a way that I was never able to see. Things are starting to become clearer now that I am older, but I will never experience a sunrise the way that he was able to. Perhaps it's because I've always been a lover of the night. There's something wondrous in the inky darkness between the stars. All that space makes my problems seem kind of small.

I never shared my love of astronomy with anyone like my brother shared his love of sunrises with me. It was the one thing that I could go back to when everything was falling to shit. And it would remain untainted. I could whisper my secrets to the stars, and they would listen, and they didn't judge me when I fumbled over my words. I could expose myself without fear that I wouldn't measure up. I loved the stars and the anonymity the night cloaked over everything. It was a love as passionate as my brother's, but it was fearful, too. He loved the light because of its honesty. I loved the night because of its protection.

I had forgotten about our sunrise dates as I pushed my brother out of my thoughts over the years, but as Lucy opened my mind, I could begin to see what Sawyer saw in the colors. I was caught off guard that night while wandering alone through Lima. The night sky was tangled in the branches of the tree tops when I broke through a clearing in Schoonover Park. The observatory was just ahead, but it was closed at this time of night. I slumped against the building and looked up into the sky. If any night was a night to need the stars, it was tonight. But it was too late and the sky was already beginning to brighten. The waves on the water ahead of me were changing, too, reflecting the golden pastels of the sky. As the sun ascended above the trees, it transformed from rosy tangerine to gold to shimmering white, and for one moment I was granted a glimpse into Sawyer's mind. It was beautiful.

The police picked me up within the hour, and I was lucid enough to act exhausted instead of high. I mumbled my address and they took me home. My parents told me that I was grounded before my head hit my pillow and everything faded to black. How could I begin to explain to them that I was finally becoming the son they really wanted? The son they loved the most.

I slept on and off all day that Saturday, finally dragging myself out of bed late that night to get something to eat. I could hear softly heated voices drifting from the kitchen, and I stopped just before the doorway to eavesdrop on my parents.

"…not okay, Mary!" Dad growled.

"It's just-" I could hear the anguish in mom's voice. "We were past this, Dwight! I can't do this again. I just can't!"

"I know, honey," Dad sighed, releasing some of the anger from his voice. "But I just need you to trust me. Can you do that?"

Mom mumbled something incoherent, and I heard a stool scrape across the kitchen floor. I backed into the hall and slipped up the stairs to my room before they knew I was there. It was becoming too much effort for them to even pretend like they weren't angry with each other. They were arguing right in the house now. I laid on my bed and stared up at a ceiling of glow-in-the-dark stars I'd put up, and even though my stomach was growling, I wasn't hungry anymore.

* * *

AN: This chapter is titled _Tiny Vessels_ _or __I've Been Eating (For You)_ based on the songs by Death Cab For Cutie and Bright Eyes, respectively.

Other songs featured in this chapter include _That Power_ by Childish Gambino, _Something_ by The Beatles, _Popular_ by Kristin Chenoweth, _Thinkin' 'Bout You_ by Frank Ocean, _Falling Slowly_ by The Swell Season, _Green Eyes_ by Coldplay, _A Long Walk _by Jill Scott, _Caged Bird _by Alicia Keys, _Wonderwall_ by Ryan Adams (originally sung by Oasis), and _Killer_ by The Plain White T's.

Pop culture referenced in this chapter includes Conor Oberst, _The Witch of Portobello _by Paulo Coelho, _The Catcher in the Rye _by JD Salinger, Abilisa, _Still I Rise_ by Maya Angelou, _Romeo and Juliet _by William Shakespeare, _Jane Eyre_ by Charlotte Bronte, Alexander Supertramp, and Henry David Thoreau.

Addicere is the Latin root for the word addiction.

This chapter is unofficially titled _The Love Chapter_ if you couldn't tell by all the references and songs. I tried to explore some of the different themes of love and ways that people express their love or struggle to maintain it when the going gets tough. It's in no way an exhaustive list. I didn't even really talk about how Sam related to his parents. I'm sure there are other people who've written better love stories than this. Maybe even include EL James and Stephanie Meyer.

This was a really difficult chapter to write for some reason. Sometimes I feel like there are a million different emotions coursing through Sam, and it's hard for me to pin down how he's going to express them. I'm trying to stay out of the other characters' heads so much and allow their feelings to be expressed through their actions, but sometimes it's damn hard to do that, especially knowing in which direction their heading and how it relates to how far they've come.

The hardest thing, I think, is still making them feel like the original Glee characters while imposing my story upon them. With some characters it's easier, but Sam and Mercedes are definitely trying to break their Glee molds. In some ways I think that's great, but I don't want to change them completely. I'm not the best at writing a nerdy Sam or a super divafied Mercedes. Mercedes has had plenty of opportunities to go all hell to the nizzy no on people (Sam, actually, since that's who we see her with), but that's not who she is to me. She has the potential to be that person, but as a whole she's more of the vulnerable girl from _Heart_. I love that aspect of Mercedes because even when she's vulnerable, she still does what will keep her true to herself. And Sam is the worried kid from _Rumours_. And I love who they were together, especially around _Saturday night Glee-ver_. That's what I see. Take it or leave it, but I hope that this makes things clearer.

This chapter was Fabrevans heavy, and sorry if you don't like that. Things are far from perfect with them. Just listen to Tiny Vessels or I've Been Eating (For You). Also, I hope to have the next chapter, unofficially titled _The Religion Chapter_, out much faster than this one. The holidays and life kind of took me for a while.

If you're still hanging in there, thank you, and, as always, comments and critique is welcomed. Thanks for reading.


	6. Bad Religion, Laughing With

AN: The full chapter title is _Bad Religion (You Found Me) _or_ Laughing With._

* * *

"In July 1620, a group of 102 Separatists set sail from London on a journey to a new world. They had their sights set on the Colony of Virginia where they hoped to start a new life in a place untouched by James I. They came for difficult. I mean, I mean different reasons, but most were compelled by religion."

My palms were beginning to sweat, and the paper had begun to shake slightly in my hand. I swear the temperature was rising a degree a second. _Take a deep breath_, I told myself. _Slow down._

"Take your time, Sam," Mrs. Penkala said. She was a District Special Education Director the school had brought in recently. Parents had been increasingly vocal about getting their kids help, and Mrs. Penkala had been McKinley's answer. Personally, I preferred Artie, but after Principal Figgins had contacted my parents about her, most of my sessions were with her now.

I nodded and swallowed. _Where was I?_ "In 1987, Marvel Comics float in the Thanksgiving Day Parade in Manhattan featured comic book characters like Captain America, Wolverine, Power Man and Dr. Doom…wait. I-I wasn't there. I meant, um, can I have a minute? I just need some water," I huffed, slumping against the table.

"Sure," she nodded. "Everybody take five."

Today we were having a group session to help us become better public speakers. Ryder and a kid they called Stoner Brett were both in my group. They'd already read the first two paragraphs of their papers, and already they were improving (though Mrs. Penkala thought that it was both inappropriate and offensive for Brett to insinuate that peace pipes were the grandfathers to modern day weed pipes). Before working with Mrs. Penkala, Ryder didn't even know that he was dyslexic. His entire life he'd been plagued by thoughts that he was stupid. His parents kept telling him that if he worked hard enough, his grades would reflect his effort. He admitted that he couldn't read to Jake, one of the other Glee kids, and Jake got him in touch with Mrs. Penkala. Most days, he and I bonded over our common struggle, but today I felt like I was going it alone.

I escaped into the hall, nearly running for the water fountain. I didn't realize how anxious I'd become until I was out of that room and out from under the piercing gaze of the group. The water was cool going down, and the pressure in my chest started to release.

"You okay, man?"

I hadn't heard him come up, but Ryder had followed me from the classroom. His brow was furrowed and he watched me nervously. I wondered what I looked like to him. Right now, I felt like a caged animal.

"Yeah," I mumbled. "Nerves, I think." I gave what I felt like was a reassuring smile, but I could tell that he wasn't buying it.

He leaned against the lockers and crossed his arms. "You're entitled to a bad day or two, you know?"

"Yeah, I know," I said slowly, releasing tension from my voice. "I'm fine. Really." But I wasn't. I was working out twice a day and watching what I ate obsessively. I was worried about falling from the top because being on top meant you didn't have to take crap from anybody. No teasing. No slushy facials. I was extra moody, and Mercedes had even sent me away a few times. Half the time she mumbled something about Quinn and the other half about needing to call her mom. She seemed to be almost avoiding me, but I couldn't blame her.

"Okay," he said choosing to drop it."I'm just making sure, you know, so that you're on your A game this weekend. We have sectionals on Saturday, and if we beat Pike Friday, then we're in the Championship."

I took another drink and nodded. "Don't forget we're playing Lincoln again next week for Thanksgiving."

"I haven't forgotten," Ryder shrugged, "but that doesn't even count. That's just practice."

"I just don't want to screw it all up right at the end, you know?" I rested on the lockers beside Ryder and chewed on the inside of my lip. "Everybody's counting on me to finish this season strong. It doesn't take much to get smacked down to the bottom at this school."

Ryder didn't say anything for a moment. Then he patted me on the shoulder. "We're a team, Sam. If we fail, it's all of our faults."

"You're right," I said. But I was thinking about Marley and how extra sensitive people were around competitions a year later. Even knowing that she was pressured into starving herself, people still blamed her for their loss. No one ever said anything about it out loud, but you just knew.

"Come on," Ryder smiled. "I want to know how you bridge together the pilgrims and Marvel comics at the Macy's parade."

* * *

The stadium lights felt like fire on my skin. I was in hell. I knew it by the amount of red swimming across my vision. The Pike players seemed to grow ten feet tall in front of me as I swiveled around and between them. If I could just make another touchdown I'd prove myself. The tie would be broken, and two weeks from now we'd be marching to victory. But they kept knocking me off of my feet, tossing me around like a sack puppet in an attempt to force an overtime situation. My head hit the ground hard a few times, and I was glad for the protection of my helmet. Sawyer didn't have a helmet to protect him the one time he needed it the most, and the rest of us were left paying for his lack of forethought.

I pushed towards our end zone, and though they tripped me up, I regained balance and forced my way to a win. I could feel myself being lifted by my teammates. We were officially going to the State championships. In those moments, the Pike players seemed small. They'd shrunk from men to mice in seconds; we'd forced the fight out of them. But as they left the field, I couldn't help but to empathize with their pain. I locked eyes with the Pike quarterback, a kid named Manny Souza, and he nodded slightly, acknowledging our victory. I'd seen videos of him in action online, and he was a powerhouse. Over the last four years, Pike had built a winning team around Manny, and this was supposed to be their year. Manny was never cocky about his abilities, however, and he always put his team first. Because of this, they were the toughest team we'd played this year. I nodded back, and as he turned away I could only wonder why bad things happen to good people.

Mom and Dad laid down their swords for the time being. The holidays were fast approaching. As a gift to me, my punishment for staying out all night lasted only a week. They said it was because of my stellar track record, but it felt more like a bribe for protecting Stevie and Stacey from their arguing. I still had two important games and sectionals coming up, and Stacey was playing the lead in the first grade Christmas play. Stevie's grades were picking up, as well, due to the decreased tension in the house. But the holidays were a band-aid for the problems that still bubbled under the surface. As young as they were, my little brother and sister didn't pick up on all the social cues that our parents were at war, but they were smiling again, so I fought the parts of me that said this wasn't real.

Before going to sectionals, I finally let my parents meet Quinn. I thought it was safe enough now that she was starting to forgive me for Bright Night. She charmed them and smiled on cue, but every move she made was provocative. Dad's eyes widened when she brushed against me briefly in a manner that wasn't altogether innocent. And he noticed how antsy she seemed like it had been days since her last hit. My mother, however, had never been a particularly good judge of character. She praised Quinn for her beauty and moral upbringing and thought that it was sweet that we had prayer group at her house every week, though in actuality it meant very good medicine for my physical needs. Mom herself no longer believed in God, and we hadn't been to church since Sawyer died, but she always felt guilty for being the cause of our potential disbelief.

"It was about time," Mom cooed, hugging Quinn. Quinn smiled warmly back when Mom released her. "Not that we didn't think you were lovely, Quinn. We just wondered why Sam would want to keep a girl like you a secret from us."

"I'm sure that he was just nervous, Mrs. Evans," Quinn replied.

"Nonsense," Mom replied. "Sam just likes to keep us in the dark about the things that are really important to him. He probably thinks we'll screw them all up."

"Seriously, Mom?" I narrowed my eyes at her, but she continued to smile at Quinn.

"Really, Mary," Dad chastised, but Mom ignored him, too.

"I'm sure that's not the case. Surely Sam wouldn't keep secrets from you two," Quinn said with an extra sweet smile. "You two are just too lovely."

"Thank you, Quinn," Mom replied, her smile growing bigger.

"Yes, thank you, Quinn," I said tightly, then looked towards my parents. "But we have to go. We're getting dinner before, okay? We'll see you there later, though."

"You'll ride home with us, Sam," Dad said firmly.

"Yeah, Dad, I know." I rolled my eyes.

"It was really nice to meet you, Quinn. Maybe you could join us sometime next week around the holiday?" Dad offered. "Obviously not on actual Thanksgiving because you'll want to spend that with your family, but Friday maybe."

"That sounds great," Quinn replied.

I pulled her towards her car, and we crowded inside. "Really, what the hell was that?" I said as soon as Quinn pulled out onto the road.

"What? Your parents really love me. Don't worry." She caressed my hand, and I pulled away.

"You basically told them that I have secrets!" My voice was getting louder. "Seriously. My dad is going to go ballistic. Why didn't you go all the way? 'Oh by the way, Mr. and Mrs. Evans, your son is on fucking drugs that I supply to him,'" I mocked. "If you're gonna tell it, then you better tell it all."

"What is your fucking problem?" Quinn yelled back at me. "I didn't say anything! I looked at you once the whole time."

"You can't do stuff like that with my parents! They don't fucking get it! You heard my dad. They don't trust me, and when you do shit like that, it only makes it worse!" I slumped in the seat and ran my hands down my face. Quinn pulled the car into a gas station and parked.

"Look. I'm not going to argue with you," she said more calmly. "I'll drop you back off at home, and your parents can take you. I don't need this shit right now."

I sighed and turned towards her. Quinn was leaning against the window, and her eyes brimmed with tears. "I'm sorry, okay," I said softer. "There's just a lot of stuff going on, and it's not about you. It's my parents, and everything's screwed up."

"I know," she whispered, and she blinked back her tears. "But you don't trust me enough to tell me anything." Her lip quivered as she tried to hold herself together, and I remembered her quietly sitting by my side at Bright Night as Mercedes questioned me about my parents. She sighed, and I knew what was released in that breath: _But you can tell Mercedes._

"I'm sorry, Quinn," I said again, reaching for her hands. She didn't draw away. "Look at me, please." She obliged, and I traced the lines of her face with my fingertips. "You are beautiful, and I want to be with you," I said, swallowing a lump that had formed in my throat. "Just you. Okay? And if that means telling you everything, I want to do that."

She searched my eyes for a second before nodding and letting me hold her for a minute. She then started the car and drove us to her house. "Tell me everything," she whispered, pulling me into her room.

Quinn didn't mind being vulnerable with me, so I knew that it hurt her when I refused to do the same. When I came along, she was looking for someone to be a vessel for her pain. She didn't fully trust God anymore, but she hadn't given up yet. Nietzsche spoke to her when she was first exiled by her family.

"'God is dead,'" she said grabbing a book from her nightstand and flipping through well worn pages to a spot she'd searched for many times before. "'God remains dead. And we have killed him. Yet his shadow still looms. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?'" She smiled at me, her teeth scraping her bottom lip. "I memorized this entire section trying my damnedest to make every word true." She shook her head. "But I wasn't dead yet, even after everything. So I knew that God still had to be somewhere, but I still don't know where."

She looked tiny, and I pulled her closer to me. "Do you kiss your mother with that mouth?" I whispered.

"Not for a long time."

Everyone was on edge when Quinn and I finally got to school. She'd sped through the streets of town to get there on time. Their eyes burned holes into us, but everyone was more relieved than angry. I couldn't really blame them. It was time for the New Directions to redeem themselves. This year, Dalton was defending a National's trophy after their high-flying, soul-feeding routines had stolen America's heart last year. We had a lot to prove.

"Don't be so nervous, Sam," Artie pulled up beside me as I moved around in my seat. I couldn't get comfortable. "You're doing that tapping thing, and you only do that when you're nervous or uncomfortable."

I stuffed my hands into my pockets and smiled. I hadn't even realized I'd been doing it. "Observant, you are," I said in my best Yoda voice. "I'm a little bit of both, I think. I'm just ready to win."

"Still riding that high from destroying Pike last night?"

"This guy was the man of the hour!" Ryder appeared from nowhere and gave my shoulders a firm squeeze before plopping down beside me. "I honestly don't know how you do it every week, man."

"Bring it in!" Mr. Schue was gathering everyone for the pre-show circle.

"Two more games," I said, moving in, and Ryder gave me thumbs up.

I was always pleasantly surprised by the lights on stage and how they shine in your eyes and nearly blind you to everything past the edge of the stage. I felt like the prisoner in Plato's cave, content to live my life behind the allusion of the shadows. Nothing was real past the boundaries of the stage, and what isn't real can't hurt you.

Why did we deserve the trophy more than Dalton? For years they struggled to prove that they were better than us, and last year their victory was tainted by our forfeit. They won by default and were left in the dark on whether or not their presentation was actually better. This was their time to really show that they'd outgrown the New Directions. They would escape the cave to learn that the shadows were only one dimension of the truth. They'd show us what was real and that our feelings of superiority were the real illusion. I questioned God's motives a lot these days, and the moment that Artie lifted the Sectionals' trophy above his head gave credence to my building theory that bad things always happened to good people.

"Congratulations on your Sectionals' win," Mercedes said, patting me on the shoulder. "What did you guys do again?"

"A Beatles medley," I replied. It was Tuesday now, and Mercedes had invited me over after sending me away the last few times.

"That sounds like fun," she smiled. "Sorry I couldn't be there. I had to work extra hours this week since I'm heading out for the holiday. But thanks for offering to help me cook."

"No problem," I replied. Mercedes pulled a container of flour down from a shelf and measured it out into a bowl. "What are you doing for the holiday?"

She pushed the bowl towards me and grabbed another for herself. "I'm visiting my mom and brother in Westerville."

"Oh."

I let that sink in. In all of our time together, I had never thought to ask much about Mercedes' family. I knew she had at least one brother who'd been a junkie, and her mom had popped up on the radar lately when she turned me away. I don't know why this came as a surprise to me, but I was learning that people were greater than my perception of them. All my life I'd catalogued people in neat little bubbles in my mind. It was one way to create order in a brain that often betrayed me. But it was flat and never told the whole story. I was learning to ask more questions now, but I wasn't there yet.

"Just your mom and brother?" I asked. I allowed the silence to fill in the rest of the question.

"Well I'll see some aunts, uncles, and cousins, too," she replied quickly. "If you're thinking about my dad, my parents aren't together anymore. He still lives here."

I tried to imagine what it might be like if my parents divorced. When I was younger and those thoughts bounced around, I didn't have a real grasp on what it meant. Now, though, I had a much better idea. Mercedes' dad wouldn't get to see her on Thanksgiving. That's a reality her whole family accepted. Quinn's mom had remarried since her father abandoned them. Was she seeing him during Thanksgiving this year? I didn't want to split the holidays.

I glanced around. Mercedes' kitchen was bright and open, but I felt like the walls were collapsing around me. I breathed in deeply to settle myself. The smell of lavender permeated everything, giving the air a distinct purple flavor.

"Are you okay, Sam?" Mercedes looked concerned, and I nodded slowly.

"I just need some water," I answered lamely.

She poured me a glass, and I downed it quickly. Mercedes brown eyes shown as she watched me. "What's going on with you today?"

"Do you ever think about God sometimes?" I blurted out. "Just like what the hell does God want from us? I mean the only reason my parents aren't arguing is because Thanksgiving's in two days, but what's going to happen after that?" Mercedes pushed her stool out and walked to me. "And Quinn's all fucked up inside when all she wanted was somebody to love her." She took my hand. "And then there's you." Mercedes put her fingers to my lips and shook her head. I was breathing hard.

"My first love affair was with a pair of purple pants. They were the first thing I ever bought myself after moving to LA," she laughed slightly. "I still have them somewhere in the back of my closet, but I haven't worn them since moving back.

"One of my best friends in college was a religion major, and we became friends when she saw my purple pants. She told me that purple was a priestly color and how she'd only fill her house with purple flowers. I like the thought of that." She lowered her fingers from my lips, brushing them against my skin as she did, leaving little trails of electricity. "I like to think that God lives in purple things."

I could see this love of violet all over the house. There were photos of lilacs hanging in the bathroom and pillows made of crushed purple chenille rested on the couch. The walls of her bedroom were a pale plum. I glanced around her kitchen, breathing in the smell of lavender. I wasn't so sure about God but something unexplainable lingered in the air.

"Do you even believe in God, Sam?" Mercedes was staring at me intently.

"I haven't been to church in years; my mom gave it up because she was angry that Sawyer died. She even played _Born Secular_ at his funeral," I shrugged. I knew that wasn't the same thing, and I swallowed a knot in my throat before answering more truthfully. "Sometimes, and sometimes I just think God's a tale we teach ourselves so we aren't so afraid of the unknown."

Mercedes took a step back but her presence still lingered within inches of me. She still held my hand. "I've had some really low points in my life." She talked slowly, choosing her words very carefully. "And God was the only thing that I could turn to to help me make sense of the chaos. Because life is too hard to go through it alone, without something to hold onto and without something that's sacred."

My breathing had slowed, and I took my hand from hers. "I just wish I had answers," I mumbled.

"Don't we all?" She smiled a small smile. "But all we can do is live a good life, whatever that means, and we'll end up where we deserve."

I was thankful that my family was all together for the holiday. I was thankful for my siblings' laughter. I was grateful that my parents weren't arguing even if they wanted to. Grandma Jean came up on Wednesday, and I was thankful that there was more than one generation's length between me and a great perhaps.

I was dragging when Monday morning arrived. Lincoln fell quickly, and I wasn't quite sure, but I thought that I saw the slightest bit of relief in the players' eyes, but that could be my own warped perception of things. The weekend was a blur of sex, drugs, and rock and roll, to be as clichéd as possible. I hadn't thanked God for Quinn on Thursday, but I thanked God for her everyday that weekend. I wasn't quite as thankful on Monday morning, and walking into practice at the end of the day, I was certain that she was a curse sent just for me.

"I have to submit this roster by tomorrow," Coach Beiste was yelling. "That means these drug screens have to be done by today! It's simple. You pee in the cup. You come out clean, you play. You don't, you walk."

Was this the cruel joke that God had been waiting to play? I could feel my throat getting tighter as my teammates went up and collected their cups. I couldn't move. My legs were frozen. Quinn had given me a choice, and I had made my own bed. At some point at the end of the 19th century, Oscar Wilde had penned the quote, "We are each our own devil, and we make this world our hell." More than a hundred years before I was faced with a choice that I knew could ruin me, Oscar Wilde was singing my life with his words.

I could run. I could back out of the door and hope that no one saw me, but it was already too late. Ryder put his arm around me for a moment and tapped me on the chest. Coach Beiste was staring me down. Somewhere far away, above the waves of guilt crashing over me, I could hear her compelling me forward, and against their will, I forced my legs to move.

It was over before I even had a chance to think about it. Any thoughts of a college football career. Any thoughts of sharing in a State championship with my teammates. Any chance whatsoever of being the person I was looking to become at the start of the year. And with it would go my status, my siblings' adoration, and my parents' love.

"I'm sorry, Sam," Coach Beiste was saying. We were in her office, and at first she was angry, but she was full of regret now. "I can't let you play."

"But it's the championship game, Coach!" I was gripping onto the arms of the chair so hard that my knuckles were white. "Please!"

"I'm sorry, Sam," she repeated, throwing her hands up. "There's nothing that I can do."

"This is bullshit!" I yelled, standing fast. I pressed my hands onto the desk in front of me, tears blurring my vision. "You can't do this to me! I've carried this team all this way, Coach! We're undefeated. You have to let me play!"

Coach Beiste leaned back in her chair, putting more distance between us. "No. What's bullshit is that you weren't thinking about them before," Coach Beiste refuted. She stood up, her anger building again. "What's bullshit is that you've thrown so many opportunities away! Do you know how many guys would kill to have what you had? Guys who worked hard and deserved better! But you were selfish, Sam!" She spat at me. "And I refuse to jeopardize the rest of this team for you. End of discussion. You can clean out your locker later this week."

I stared her down for a moment until everything blurred together in front of me. Coach Beiste moved faster than I knew she could, and in one smooth motion, she was holding me. "Go home, Sam," she said soothingly. "I'll call your parents."

"No!" I pulled away from her. "I-I'll tell them. I just need a minute, Coach. Please."

Coach Beiste nodded and released me, but I knew that it was a lie. The minute I left this room, my parents would learn about what I'd done. By tomorrow everyone would know.

I ran from the locker room in the opposite direction of the field. I couldn't face them. Not yet. Not after what I was costing them. Maybe they didn't really need me. I was just one piece of the puzzle, but I couldn't be the glue. They would do fine without me. Phil had made that clear from the beginning. They didn't need me, and they could prove it now.

My parents had called ten times by the time I reached Mercedes' house, but I couldn't face them either. Not until I talked to her. I rang the doorbell and waited. My heart beat heavily and the pressure in my chest refused to leave. How long had I been standing there, desperately wanting? I knocked on the door and rang the bell again. Silence. I walked the ten blocks to Broken Records, but I had the aching feeling that she wouldn't be there, either.

Raphael was working the register and waved to me when she saw me outside of the store. I smiled, and leaning against the glass, I slid to the pavement and pulled out my phone. It rang twice before she answered.

"Where are you, Mercedes?" I asked.

"I'm still in Westerville. I'll be back in town tomorrow night. Why? What's up?" She sounded happy, and I could hear Lennon barking in the background. Soulful music assaulted my ears, and a deep male voice pealed with laughter.

What the hell was I doing attempting to unload my hurt and anger onto her? Mercedes was kind to spend so much time with me, but who was I? I didn't deserve anything from her, and I had made Quinn a promise. But here I was once again using Mercedes as a shield against my demons.

"Sam?" She asked. I could hear her begin to worry.

"Never mind," I said quickly. "It wasn't anything important. I'll see you when you get back."

I hung up before she could protest and called Artie.

"Dude, your parents called my parents asking if I'd seen you!" He said before I could even finish my hello. "What's going on?"

It was harder admitting to Artie what had happened than I thought it would be, but he listened and didn't interrupt.

"Dude you can't run from this," he said finally. "Go home and talk to your parents."

"I don't know if I can do that," I admitted reluctantly.

"You have to," Artie said. "You owe that to them."

The story of Icarus goes as such. King Minos of Crete had imprisoned the great craftsman Daedalus within the wall of his own creation, the Labyrinth. But his genius would not suffer captivity. He made two pairs of wings by adhering feathers to a wooden frame with wax. Giving one pair to his son, he cautioned him that flying too near the sun would cause the wax to melt. But Icarus became ecstatic with the ability to fly and forgot his father's warning. The feathers came loose and Icarus plunged to his death in the sea.

My parents grounded me indefinitely. They admitted their fault in not paying close enough attention but made it clear that that was no excuse for my actions. Dad placed a good bit of the blame on Quinn, but Mom was on the fence. I was a leper at school, and for the rest of the week leading up to the championship, most people just whispered behind my back. By the time Friday had come and gone, however, and the Titans returned defeated, people didn't bother with hushed tones. Tensions were high all around me. Ryder was avoiding me, and more than once I'd narrowly escaped a run-in with a group of angry players still searching for reasons why. Quinn blamed herself, though she could hardly be held accountable for something that I could have turned down. The worst thing was breaking the news to Stevie and Stacey about why I didn't play that game.

"Were you sick?" Stacey asked me, her big green eyes bright and shining. To her, at least, I was still a big brother in shining armor. Stevie was sitting quietly and shook his head disapprovingly. I wasn't sure how much he understood, but he wasn't stupid, and he was getting older.

"Yeah," I said back. "I'm as sick as they come."

I exiled myself during lunch, preferring hanging out with Quinn to the judging stares I received the rest of the day. We learned each other in those times, and I was beginning to lean on her more and more. I had no privileges at home. No escape from the unreleased tension that the holidays kept at bay. Artie was preoccupied with Sugar, working with the local PBS station, and college applications. I had no time to see Mercedes, though she'd left several messages on my phone since returning.

I went Christmas shopping with Mom, and I bought things for the people that meant the most to me. I took a few things to school. One for Artie, something for Mercedes, and something else for Quinn.

Artie was ecstatic about the camera lens I'd got him. He'd wanted it for a while.

"Well, I thought that this might tip the scales towards you becoming Spielberg," I said proudly.

He smiled back. "I've been applying to some of the best schools from California to New York to Prague, even. Secretly, of course, but we'll see what the parental units have to say if I get an acceptance package in the mail." He laughed.

I rummaged around in my bag a bit and pulled out another, smaller package. He raised a brow, and I told him that it was for Mercedes. With the amount of extra supervision on me now, I knew that I wouldn't be able to give it to her myself, but I still wanted her to know that I cared.

"Mercedes doesn't usually accept gifts," Artie said when I handed it to him.

"Why not?" I asked.

He shrugged. "She just has a thing. I don't know. She always volunteers at the SAIL Center around Christmastime and tells people to donate there instead."

"What's the SAIL Center?"

"It's for domestic violence and victims of rape," Artie replied solemnly.

My heart rate was increasing. I could feel it all over my body. I was sweating, but I had suddenly gone cold inside like someone had turned off the light. Mercedes singing _Caged Bird_. Mercedes' parents separated. Mercedes' house turned into a purple-infused sanctuary. Her escape across the country. Things were starting to make sense. It was fucked up, but she didn't seem like such an enigma anymore. It still offered no good reasons for her to return. I swallowed. Hard. "Do you…do you know why she goes there?" I was trembling all over. I didn't want to know the answer if it was what I feared, but I had to know something.

"She told me that they just like to hear her sing," he shrugged then frowned. "And if she has other reasons, I couldn't bring myself to ask." He dropped his gaze. "God forgives you for not asking, right? I don't know if that makes me a good friend or not, though."

I released a breath and put a hand on Artie's shoulder. "You are a good friend, Artie," I assured him, and he met my eyes. "Please just give that to Mercedes when you see her."

He nodded and tucked it into his bag.

Quinn was waiting for me in our usual spot by the bleachers. I kissed her hard on the mouth to ground myself.

"Well hello, stranger," she whispered against my lips when I finally pulled back.

"Come on," I said, pulling away.

We made our way into an empty classroom, and she leaned against a desk, looking at me with curiosity as I went down on one knee and pulled out a ring box.

"Oh my God, are you proposing?" Her eyes were wide, and she shrank back from me. "We've known each other for just a few months. Stand up! You're freaking me out."

"I want to marry you, someday, but until then will you accept this promise ring?" We were growing closer. We were listening to each other and starting to really care for each other, and even though we were both damaged, I thought that maybe it was possible for me to patch her up.

"What are you, six?" Quinn shook her head disbelievingly.

"If you accept, this ring will symbolize my promise to be true, to never pressure you to do anything you're not comfortable with, to listen to your problems," I stood and moved in closer. "To tell you when you have food in your teeth or eye gunk." She smiled, shaking her head. "To come over your house whenever you need something super heavy moved around. I promise to make you feel proud when you point down the hall and say, 'That dude's my boyfriend.'" She glanced at the ring in my hand. "I promise to do all of those things, without trying to sound like Matthew McConaughey."

She smiled and put her arms around me. "I like when you sound like Matthew McConaughey."

"I really care about you, Quinn." I touched my forehead to hers. "And I want us to be together."

She took the ring box from me and closed it, then handed it back.

"Is that a no?" I asked, hoping not to sound too defeated.

"It's a maybe. I'll let you know when I come back from vacation." She smiled. This was the first year that she didn't want to go to Cabo for the holidays, but she'd planned to call me every day, and that was something.

Vacation was only two weeks, but it would test the remains of my sanity that my mother and drugs hadn't already stripped away from me. I was having withdrawals from everything. School. Life. Love. Friends. Drugs. Sex. God. My skin crawled under the weight of all of the lives that I wasn't living, and at some point as I watched my parents dance with fake plastic smiles to _What Are You Doing New Year's Eve?,_ I realized that I had to get out.

It wasn't hard faking sick in the days leading up to New Year's Eve. It was a bit more difficult faking being sick enough for Mom and Dad to hire a babysitter for Stevie and Stacey so that they could go out that night. It had been nearly a month since my drug scandal, I hadn't been in trouble since then, and they were letting their guard down enough for me to pull this off. Quinn's vacation to Cabo was the tipping point for Dad. He'd have never believed it otherwise.

"I don't know," Mom was saying. "Are you sure you'll be fine, Sam? I could stay home," she offered.

"Let the boy alone, Mary," Dad said. "He needs his rest, and he knows how to call for help if he needs it."

I was thankful for Dad being rational yet naïve. The timeout on their arguing had actually done them some good, and they were trying to be in love again. They were dressed to impress for the first time in weeks, and they were standing closer to each other than I'd seen them lately.

"We'll be back early," Mom said. "There's some soup in a Tupperware container on the left side of the second shelf in the fridge. There's also some ginger ale. I'm leaving a list of numbers by the phone. Now you call us if anything comes up, okay? And you can always give Mrs. Johnson a call, too. She's just down the street, and I'm sure she'll be up for a while with your brother and sister."

"Mom, this isn't World War III," I groaned. "I'll be fine. I just need to lie down for a while."

She kissed my forehead and stroked my shoulder before leaving. Dad looked at me curiously but said nothing. I could hear the car backing out of the drive and waited a few minutes before creeping out of bed. I kept a healthy level of skepticism that the night would go off without a hitch, but I was hopeful, too.

Mom's car keys were hiding out where she always left them, and it didn't take me long to convince Artie and Sugar to meet me at The Lima Bean. There were already a fair amount of people out at this hour. Many people were dressed in costume and handing out fliers to various parties around town. They were huddled in a booth in the back when I arrived.

"So your parents finally let you off the leash!" Artie exclaimed as I settled in. I smiled noncommittally. If anything, Artie would have the amnesty of ignorance. "It's about time!"

"Yeah, there was a rumor going around that your parents were renting you out for slave labor," Sugar added.

I furrowed my brow. "Definitely not a slave," I laughed.

"So what are you thinking about getting into tonight?" Artie asked.

"I literally have no idea. I've been pretty much off the radar. I was hoping that you guys might know of something," I said hopeful.

Sugar smiled and glanced at Artie. "You're going to love this," she said.

I felt like a fugitive knocking at Mercedes' door a half hour later. She'd texted back that she was at home with Kurt waiting for the ball to drop. The night was still young, and there was no way I was going to allow her to ring in the New Year like an old maid. She might have a house full of cats in her future, but she was going to get out and make some life first.

"Sam!" She exclaimed. "What are you doing here?" She was blasted from behind by the warm glow from her house, and even though she was dressed in a form-fitting black catsuit, her hair sweeping the soft edges of her face in dark waves with a smile reserved only for succubae, she looked more angelic than any woman I'd ever seen. I'd missed her, I realized, and I hadn't even known it until then. Lavender wafted from inside, and all I could think was that this was what home smelled like.

Artie and Sugar were catcalling from the car, and she waved to them and laughed. "We're coming to take you to a party at the abandoned warehouse on eleventh street," I stated.

Her eyes grew wide. "Do you realize how cold it is outside?"

"Yeah, I know," I replied. "But it'll be fun. I swear."

She glanced at the car where Artie and Sugar waited impatiently and then looked back at me. "I don't know, Sam."

"Who is at the door?" Kurt's voice came from somewhere around the corner. "You're letting all of the heat out!" He stood behind Mercedes with his arms tucked across his chest. "Sam!" He said when he glimpsed me. "I haven't seen you in a while."

"Yeah, I know." I smiled.

"Why are you standing in the doorway?" He asked, pushing in next to Mercedes. Lennon was sniffing alongside their legs and whining. "Come in."

I nodded towards the car, where Sugar and Artie began catcalling Kurt. "We really just came to abduct you two to a party downtown. Mercedes told me that you guys were staying in, and I figured that you could have a much better time hanging out with us, but Mercedes doesn't want to brave the cold."

Kurt's eyes grew wide, and he turned to her. "Mercy, are you serious? We have to go!"

Mercedes was conflicted, and I gave her a pleading smile. Artie and Sugar continued to call from the car, and she finally gave in. "I can't stay out super late, though. Lennon gets antsy when he's alone for too long, and he'll start chewing on things," she stressed.

"No problem," I agreed. "Neither can I."

There was no stage and a generator powered the substandard heating system and an array of Christmas lights dotting along the walls. The walls were all exposed brick and graffiti-the most striking was a mural of a Mexican girl standing in the ashes of the Apocalypse, and the only places to sit were on crates and broken chairs dragged in from the trash over the years. There was a burnt out car in the middle of it all, and on and surrounding it was a 19-piece brass band called What Cheer? Brigade playing the chords to _No Church In The Wild_. Hundreds of lost boys littered this wasteland turned sanctuary for everything that mattered in the world. Someone was passing out glow sticks and someone else was passing out things to set men free. There was a bum fire just outside and the glow threw ghoulish shadows on the walls. Like scarecrows in dreams. Like Plato all over again.

Though we stayed pretty close to the exit for Artie's sake, we still found ourselves surrounded. Sugar was draped across Artie's lap like a modern day Venus, and Kurt had somehow found Blaine in the mix. They held each other tightly like the soulmates Zeus had envied. I wasn't sure when they'd started hooking up, but I was glad that Kurt had found somebody. Mercedes had me by the hand, and she was dancing circles around me, her hair whipping like a shadowy halo. She giggled at my attempts at rhythm, and I confessed that I was a better slow dancer than hip shaker. But she refused to get too close to me.

The band died down, and a single woman rose from its midst to the top of the car. She was mocha-skinned and pretty with a trail of birds tattooed across her collarbone, and I recognized her as Raphael. Mercedes whistled and stood on her tip toes to get a better look. Raph held a megaphone in her hand, and she began to recite the words of _Because He Liked To Look At It_ from the Vagina Monologues. Artie gave his camera to Kurt, and he held it above the crowd, recording everything.

Mercedes leaned against me, and I slowly inched my arm until I'd wrapped myself around her. She looked at peace watching her friend and coworker. And I thought about what Artie had told me, and I prayed with everything in me that she only went to the SAIL Center to sing. But even if she needed the services they supplied, I prayed that she might one day have a "Bob," and that it might even be me. Applause shattered the mood as Raph lead the rallying cry of _Cunt_, and close to the end, Mercedes looked up at me, rocking back and forth in her laced-up boots.

"Thanks for inviting me," she said.

"I wouldn't have had it any other way," I shrugged.

She leaned in closer to me and took a deep breath, inhaling my cologne, and something was brewing inside. "I'm sorry about football," she said. "I never got a chance to tell you."

"Thanks," I replied. Applause and shouts of "Cunt!" rose into the air around us as Raph ended her monologue. "Can I tell you something?"

"Me first," she said, and this terrified me for some reason. She reached into her pocket and pulled out a tiny package wrapped for Christmas, and she pushed it in my coat pocket with a sad smile. "I can't accept this."

"I know," I replied. "Artie told me, but I asked him to give it to you anyways."

A new cheer rose up from the crowd, people around us began to count down to the New Year, and someone had rigged a disco ball to lower. I brushed her hair from her face, and she closed her eyes to the feel of my fingers tracing constellations across her skin. I noticed how much shorter she was than me, and I was learning how fragile she was every day, but she didn't need me to protect her. She had never asked, and I admired her resiliency. I ran my tongue across my lips and pulled her in closer to me. I needed to feel the way her body molded into mine, like the way an ocean folded into the shore, constant in its desire to fill every cleft and crevice left by the ravages of time.

"What did you want to tell me?" I could barely hear her, but the same question was in her eyes. She was close. She trembled with nerves, and her heart fluttered in her chest.

"God you're beautiful," I whispered.

"Sam," she spoke quietly back, and I was broken from my trance. I was there. I could take her. We were less than an inch apart. Everything around me was crackling into life. But her hands were between us, and I knew that she could feel the hammering in my chest. And though she didn't push against me, I couldn't will myself to go further. "I can't."

It was barely a whisper over the cacophony surrounding us as other couples crossed the threshold that had become an impasse, and _Auld Lang Syne_ transformed into a funeral march. I took a step back, and her face reflected mine.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, and I shook my head.

"No, I'm selfish," I replied.

Her lip quivered, and she wrapped her arms around herself. "It's a self-preservation thing, you see?" She moved to step closer to me but thought better of it and backed away and out of the door before I could say anything else.

Fifteen minutes later, she texted Kurt to say that she was waiting by the car, and he interrogated me the whole way there, though nothing I said was satisfactory. She smiled at us as we approached, but I felt awkward and ashamed. Kurt wrapped Mercedes in a hug and whispered things to her that made her smile.

"There are rumors of a police raid," Blaine finally said. "I'd probably leave soon just as a precaution."

We all agreed that that was our best course of action. Kurt told us not to wait up and that he'd see us later, and he strolled off hand-in-hand with Blaine. I drove Mercedes home first before dropping Sugar and Artie back at The Lima Bean where Sugar had left her car. I thought it was the most understanding thing to do. The house was still empty when I snuck back in through the back door, and I was grateful that one thing happened in my favor.

As I climbed into bed, however, I considered a few things. I wasn't a good person. I knew that. I was selfish and because of my actions, my team had suffered. And I was doing it to Quinn and to Mercedes. It was cruel and dishonest, and they deserved better than me. I punished myself bouncing back and forth between _Tonight You Belong To Me_ and _The Calendar, The Energy_ as I twirled a small present around in my fingers. The stars on my ceiling glowed bright, showering me with their nondiscriminatory light, and outside the snow erased all traces of my misdeeds.

Kurt and Blaine hadn't left immediately and were there for the beginnings of the riot. Artie had neglected to take his camera back, so Kurt continued filming as the police arrested anyone yelling "Cunt!" in their faces. Someone set a pile of broken chairs aflame just as snow danced from the sky onto the unaware revelers. Blaine drove away through masses of bodies still dancing to the beat of a 19-piece brass band, and they shared a small, lovely kiss backdropped by a world of ice and fire.

* * *

AN: This chapter is titled _Bad Religion (You Found Me) _or_ Laughing With _based on the songs by Frank Ocean, The Fray, and Regina Spektor, respectively.

Other songs featured in this chapter include "Born Secular" by Jenny Lewis and the Watson Twins; "What Are You Doing new year's Eve?" by Ella Fitzgerald; "Charlie Brown" by Coldplay; "Four Winds" by Bright Eyes; "No Church In The Wild" by Jay-Z & Kanye West; "Tonight You Belong To Me" by Eddie Vedder; "The Calendar, The Energy" by Matthew Thiessen & The Earthquakes; "Auld Lang Syne"; and "Over the Moon" and "La Vie Boheme" both from the Musical RENT.

Pop culture found in this chapter includes _The Gay Science_ by Friedrich Nietzsche, Plato's Allegory of the Cave from _The Republic_, _The Color Purple_ by Alice Walker, Oscar Wilde, Icarus, What Cheer? Brigade, _Venus of Urbino_ by Titian, _Love Actually_, and _Because He Liked To Look At It_ and _Cunt_, both from _The Vagina Monologues_ by Eve Ensler.

The SAIL Center gets its name from the Family Violence Prevention and Rape Crisis Center (S.A.I.L) of Batesville, AR. If you or someone you know is in need of help, please contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 3 or online at .

So a few things to note. I am not here for Finn, at all. I'm not even sure that I'll ever include him in this story, but if I do, then he and Rachel will both have flown apart from each other. Because when they aren't together, they actually thrive. But as it goes, I will allow other people to do the things that the actual show reserves for Finn. Also, I couldn't taint the Warblers win with drugs. Glee gave them dirty tactics, but I can't. Seriously, would S2 Warblers have ever attempted to blind Kurt or Blaine? Hell no. Screw that.

And, there. I threw everyone a bone. I'm itching to get into more of Mercedes' story, too. Can't be completely mysterious all the time, now can we? Mind my grammar and any spelling errors. I hope that you're enjoying it! Please comment and critique! Thanks so much!


	7. The Smiths or Super Rich Kids

Life revolved around me like a scene of a gunshot in the movies. You have the protagonist: some white, hetero, Jesus type of motherfucker whose mouth just wrote a check his ass couldn't cash. The antagonist is a brooding type who's described as "dark" if he isn't already a minority, and he's wasted enough money in ammo to feed a small border town for a year. The FPS rate is so high that you can see the bullet enter the chamber, explode from the barrel and whiz past the progs face. And even though he's standing there in the middle of it all, he's never hit, and bullets fly past like he's being protected by the hand of God. Those were always Artie's favorites. Something to do with the cinematography. He'd explained it to me once, but I couldn't keep up once he'd gotten going. I could see his passion for cinema then, and it made me uneasy because there was nothing I was quite as passionate about.

In less than six months, high school would be over. All of my friends would be preparing to get out of this town, and I was halfway to becoming a Lima loser. Artie would pack up to go to Prague or New York or somewhere else, and Sugar would go with him because her dad could buy her way into anywhere. Quinn had applied for early admission to Yale and her acceptance package was waiting for her when she came back from Cabo. Blaine and Kurt were making plans to move to New York together and live with their mutual friend, Rachel, and Tina was waiting impatiently on schools in Chicago. Mercedes and I weren't exactly on speaking terms at the moment, but the last time we talked, she was thinking about LA again. As for me? I was sitting on a terrible SAT score, mourning the loss of my potential football career, and wondering what the hell else there was for me to do.

I used to draw all the time. When I was younger, around seven or eight, I made my own comic strip about a master spy named the Blonde Chameleon, but I was too afraid to show anybody. Sawyer caught me working on it once and snatched it out of my hands before I could react. I pushed against him, pummeling him with my small fists in a vain attempt to make him return it, but he held it out of my reach and calmly told me to just let him read it. I remember how focused he became as he studied it, his jade eyes full of wisdom and criticism, while I stood there a giant ball of nerves, wringing my hands in an invisible ritual. His eyes grew wide as he turned page after page, devouring my adventures with rapt attention.

When he was finished, he handed it back to me and gave me a queer look. "Sam," he said slowly, bending down on one knee so that he could see me eye to eye.

"You hate it, don't you?" I whispered back before he could say the words himself. I couldn't look him in the eye even though he tugged at my chin so that I would lift my face.

"No!" He said quickly, seeing my disappointment, and I jerked my head up to meet his eyes. He had the biggest grin. "It's awesome! Really! You're really good at this. You should definitely let me know when it's finished, though. I want to be the first to read it all."

I was more careful with hiding my comics from then on, but I did as he asked and allowed him to read the books as I finished them. I never told him, but I lived for the look of satisfaction on Sawyer's face as he read them. Because, for once, he was impressed with me.

My parents didn't share the same fascination with my drawings as Sawyer did. Dad was always too busy to notice, and Mom was so enamored with Sawyer that she never left room enough for anybody else.

I sat in the kitchen once a few years later drawing up a storm for three hours before anyone even came in. There was this picture of Bugs Bunny that I was determined to copy, but I was also looking for a little bit of recognition. I was ready for my parents to see the gift that Sawyer was convinced I possessed. I'd just put on the final touches when Mom came in to start dinner. I didn't dare look her in the eye and only pretended to shield the picture so that my timidity would peak her interest. She orbited around me for a moment like the Moon orbits the Earth and removed a few things from the fridge. Then she glanced at me sidelong and cleared her throat. I slid the picture closer to her in the same moment.

"Can you take that in the living room, Sam? I need to start on dinner."

I was so determined that the dismissal didn't register at first, but even if I failed to comprehend it, my sinking posture gave away the hurt that I didn't automatically recognize was there.

"Um, what have you got there?" She said quickly in an attempt to mask her former indifference.

"It's Bugs Bunny," I replied, pushing the picture right in front of her. "I drew it!"

She picked it up to examine it closer, then, seeing the original, grabbed it to compare. I was cheezing like I'd won the lottery while her head was filling up with skepticism, though at nine no one could expect me to understand that. "You traced this, didn't you?" She said finally, and everything I'd prepared for slipped right through my fingers.

"N-no," I defended virulently. "I drew it!"

"I can see where you copied," she said. "This one's a little bigger, but you just moved it around a bit."

"I didn't copy it!" I said, snatching it from her hands and nearly ripping it in the process.

"Okay, Sam," she chuckled. "I hope your homework's finished if you've spent this much time _drawing_ a picture."

She was always worried about my homework because of how poor my school performance was at that time. I realized then that it had never even dawned on her that I might actually be smart or talented in other ways. The way she said drawing was like a cheese grater to my talent. She'd sawed my pride in half without a full realization of what she'd done. She was the sun now, and I was her Pluto. I would never show my mother another picture again, but she was still my mother, and gaining her approval was the slowest acting poison that God had ever created.

I was editing the third issue of the _Blonde Chameleon_ when Dad broke the news of Sawyer's death. To me there was little point in finishing it because no one else was going to read it. No one else's eyes sparkled at my creations. No one else believed that I was talented. I buried them with Sawyer. I stuffed them in his coffin before they closed the lid and lowered him into the ground. That's where they belonged. With the only person that had ever made them come to life.

Now I doodled from time to time, but I stopped investing so much time in seriously pursuing art. I admired other people's art instead and obsessed over other people's comics. People think that your dreams die as you get older if you fail to cultivate them, but, for certain people, they shrivel in the womb before they even know what life is.

Before my parents told us that we were moving to Lima, I thought I had a glimpse of the greatness waiting for me on the other side of high school. I'd graduate with Honors and go on to be a big shot with a full ride in either football or academics at some D1 school where my legacy would actually begin. I never thought too much farther from that, though, because I didn't actually know what I wanted to do after that. I wasn't nine anymore, and the Blonde Chameleon and all of his adventures had faded into obscurity. All of my friends seemed to have it together, though. So I played the game, too, even though I was starting to drown.

"Listen to this song," Quinn said, turning up the volume. _There_ _Is A Light That Never Goes Out_ blasted at us from every corner of her brash Canary yellow Ford coupe. "I feel it under my skin. God, Morrissey sets my loins on fire."

"Women don't have loins," I said with a crooked smile.

"I know that." She glanced at me out of the corner of her eye and pursed her lips. "You know what I mean."

I was Marty McFly, and she was Jennifer, and we raced down "Paradise Road" towards a back door down an alley in Lima Heights Adjacent where we could forget everything. When we went there, we were British Brat Packers from the eighties or nineties. Quinn could never decide which was better. And our parents grew up on Iggy Pop, Bowie, and the Stones while we worshipped Oasis, The Cure, and The Smiths. Quinn knew a lot of pop culture and at some point had decided that things were probably better back then. Parents were better. The music was better. But I _knew better_, and no matter what, there was always a time when everything was absolute shit. No amount of music would change that.

The last notes overlapped into the beginning of _Back To The Old House_, and Quinn sighed. "This is probably my least favorite song," she whispered, and she reached out for my hand. The promise ring was wrapped delicately around her right ring finger, and she'd been wearing it for three weeks now. I gripped my fingers around hers, and she smiled. She was thinking about the big, white house where she'd left her innocence.

"You're right," I agreed, but I wasn't going there with her. My thoughts were stuck on two Saturdays ago and the anguish in Mercedes' eyes as Morrissey crooned in the background.

* * *

January passed by like a hazy morning, and as far as I knew, my parents never found out about my New Year's escapades. Even if they had, all of my misdeeds were being overshadowed by Grandma Jean's illness. She'd caught the flu in the week following Christmas, and this was one devil she couldn't seem to shake. Dad traveled so often to Tennessee that he was like a phantom when we saw him, and Mom walked around like death was on her heels. The façade of happiness that the holidays ushered in was swept out the door like last year's bad luck, and bitterness and resentment settled in its place whenever both my parents were home. I spent most afternoons staring at the stars on my ceiling. There was comfort in my room, at least, and sometimes I'd pull Stevie and Stacey in, and we'd all lie on the floor with the lights out and dream of the stars.

I realized that my parents had completely forgotten about my punishment a week into the new year after I'd skipped school and crashed at Quinn's house, not returning until later that night. Mom told me that she had been worried then asked if I had a good time. She hugged me tightly, whispering how much she loved me, and I swallowed a lump in my throat before returning the sentiment. She let me go reluctantly—I could tell by her sigh as she did it—and she cupped my cheek before going to bed. I felt like I was suffocating, and I felt ashamed for no reason at all. But I had gained back my freedom, and that meant that I could finally breathe. And I could finally see Mercedes again.

Seeing her on New Year's Eve felt like what you're supposed to feel when coming home from a long vacation. You've missed the feel of your own bed and the sound of your guitar. But you don't realize how much you miss those things until they're coming back to you. I pounded the pavement to Broken Records, and I wasn't even sure she'd be there, but I was hopeful and excited anyways.

* * *

"Santana's going to meet us there," Quinn said, her face popping in and out of focus as we passed underneath the orange lamps that lined the sides of the highway. "She says it's going to be super crowded."

I nodded and stared out the window. I didn't know who this Santana person was, but it didn't matter. Most of Quinn's friends were the same. We were all running away from something. There was a lot of night before us and pale white clouds loomed high above us, pregnant with snow, and I was hoping for a whiteout.

* * *

Mercedes was filling out paperwork and wearing a green dress. I remember it because I thought about how much it matched my eyes, which made me wonder if she'd been thinking the same thing when she picked it out. But that was probably me overreaching and wishfully thinking. _Ask_ poured from the speakers as I walked up behind her. She was expecting me. I could tell by the way she turned ever so slightly but not enough for me to see her face. Had I been anyone else, she'd have greeted me the moment I walked into the store.

I reached out a hand to tap her on the shoulder but stopped midway as a vision of a warehouse downtown and Mercedes' apprehension settled over me. I dropped my hand to my side and cleared my throat instead. "I want to say that I'm sorry for trying to kiss you the last time I saw you. I made you really uncomfortable, and I never wanted to do that." I took a deep breath. "I'd understand if you still didn't want to see me, but if you do, I thought it'd be best to start there."

She paused in her work a moment, and I waited for her to say something, anything, but she just dug around in a box on the counter and continued.

"Mercedes?" My resolve was fading. Of course she was still angry with me. I should've called first instead of just showing up, again, at her doorstep as if she had all the time in the world to entertain me.

"Okay," I relented. "I get it. You're still mad at me, and I can understand that, but the least you could do is tell me that instead of letting me feel like an idiot." I gnawed on my bottom lip. Waiting. And she kept on cataloging like I wasn't even there. "Forget it."

I turned to leave and walked as slowly as I could, praying that Mercedes would be like every other woman in the movies and stop me from walking out, then tell me that I was being a twat. Then we'd move forward. But she let me get all the way to the door, and she still hadn't said anything.

"Really?" I said, turning back to her. "Are you waiting on me to beg or something because I'm not above doing that?"

"Okay, I'm not mad at you," she said exasperatedly.

"Oh, thank God," I said releasing a breath. She faced me and leaned against the counter with her arms folded. "For a second I thought you were actually going to let me walk out the door."

She rolled her eyes and shook her head. "I thought about it." She gave a crooked smile. "I _was_ mad at you. No. I was furious, but I was really angry with myself for letting things get that far. I know better than that." She moved to sit on the arm of an orange velvet chair across from the green leather one I usually occupied. "You're dating Quinn, Sam, and if you want us to stay friends, then you have to honor that. We both have to do a better job."

"I know," I sighed, sitting down across from her.

"And if that's something that you can't do, then tell me now because I don't want the same thing to happen a week from now. It's not fair to anybody."

She was right. Of course she was right. I'd said practically the same thing that night as I lay in bed. "You're my best friend, Mercedes, and I don't want to lose that."

"You _are_ an idiot, though."

She smiled a little more, and I drummed my fingers on the arms of my chair. "So are we okay?"

"Yeah," she said. "We're okay."

* * *

I struggled to keep up with Quinn as she pulled me down a dark alley towards a barely lit back door. She disentangled our fingers and wrapped herself around a raven-haired vamp with caramel skin and a cheeky disposition.

"This is Santana," Quinn said, peeling herself from the other girl, who regarded me with a critical eye. Quinn reached out and grasped my hand again. "And this is Sam."

Santana was a slightly younger version of Raphael. They had the same skin and smile, but it was in her mannerisms that the similarity was most evident. I wondered if they were related. I gave a small smile while Santana continued to look me over. "Jesus Christ, your mouth is huge. You're like a blonde Lisa Rinna," she finally said.

"Nice to meet you, too," I mumbled.

* * *

Mercedes refused to walk on eggshells around me, something for which I was grateful, and as the minutes passed, we settled back into our old ways. She made me laugh and feel comfortable. She reached for my hand without fear and brushed the hair out of my eyes when my beanie failed to do its job properly. She played good music. Right now _Louder Than Bombs_, The Smiths compilation album, was shuffling through its tracks, and _Shoplifters of the World Unite_ urged us to defend the poor.

"Musicians are geniuses," she said. "There's nowhere else in Lima that I would rather work. Not one single place." She moved about the store organizing things as we chatted, and I slouched down in the familiar green chair.

"Question," I said.

"Shoot."

"Are you actually planning to spend the rest of your life here?" I sat up in the chair, crossing my hands over my lap.

"Are you serious?" She asked, looking over her shoulder at me.

"Well, yeah," I shrugged. "It's just, you're really talented Mercedes, and Lima's a waste of a town."

"Everything I chose to love is here," she said, resuming organizing.

"But do you ever think about going back?" I asked as I spun a CD around my index finger. "I mean, you talk about LA like it's Jerusalem."

"Sometimes," she said. "My brother and I had a heart-to-heart over Christmas, and he wants me to go back."

"What do you want?" I stopped spinning the disc and placed it back in its case. Mercedes still had her back to me, and I could tell that she was thinking. It came to me then that she might actually follow her brother's advice, and if she did, there was a good possibility that I might never see her again. There was a hollow place in my stomach now that wasn't there before, and it made me uncomfortable to think of what that might mean.

"I don't know," she admitted. She stopped organizing, turning around and leaning on the shelf behind her. "I left school because my family was going through a lot of stuff at the time. Everyone told me to stay where I was. My boyfriend was so angry and hurt that I was choosing to leave, but with everything going on there was no way that I could stay." She closed her eyes against the weight of her memories, and I wondered how often she repeated this story. "It was the least selfish thing I've ever done." She walked over and settled in across from me.

"Then maybe your brother's right," I swallowed, "and it's time to be selfish again."

She smiled and glanced down at her hands. I could see her weighing the pros and cons in front of me, and I could almost hear her brother urging her to go back, but I didn't want her to leave. I could never tell her that, though.

"What kind of degree were you going for?" I asked, clearing my throat and dragging Mercedes back to the present. "They have a music program, right?"

"I was going for Business, actually," she shrugged.

"Really?" I cocked a brow. "I just thought that with your voice and your obvious love of music that that would be a logical choice."

"Well maybe for someone else it would be, but my dad's a dentist, and to him being a singer was an unreasonable and insane dream. And he's right. There're a lot of people who don't make it. Maybe it'll work out someday, but I need a backup plan." She leaned back into her chair and blew out a breath.

"And this is it, right?" I asked. "This is the end of your grand scheme. I bet your dad is really proud of you right now."

She glared at me. "You're being rude."

"I'm sorry," I said, backing down. "It's just that I can see what you could become, Mercedes, and you're wasting it."

I wondered how many people were privileged enough to get this side of Mercedes. When she sang, she commanded the stage, and her outfits always begged for an audience. I've heard her laugh heartily from time to time, but most of the time she was the quiet guru. She wasn't asking me for help or asking me to acknowledge her talents, but I felt the need then to tell her anyways. So that even though her dad had impregnated her with the idea that her talents weren't enough, I thought that they could be.

"When you open your mouth to sing, people stop and listen. I wish you could hear what I hear when you sing. Then you'd know that your dad's a fucking idiot."

She cracked a smile and turned away for a moment. "Don't call my dad a fucking idiot," she said.

"Fine," I replied, crossing my arms, and when she smiled again, I was sure that she understood the rest of my silent statement.

"Why are you so curious about school right now? Have you heard back from some schools, yet?" She leaned forward again, and she looked lighter already.

I shook my head. "Artie and I are actually meeting next week to go over some stuff about that."

Her face dropped. "You have started sending out applications, haven't you?"

"Yeah," I said slowly. "About that."

"Sam!" She chastised.

"What?" I replied. "I'm not that smart, Mercedes. That's just a fact. I'm dyslexic. I've been working with tutors so my grades are good, but I completely bombed my SATs because I'm not that great at tests. I am trying, though, and I have an appointment with Mrs. Pillsbury-Schuester on Monday to look at some schools that don't require standardized tests."

She sat there for a moment and gave me a sad smile. "I'm sorry," she said. "My dad worked us like dogs, and he was always on us about our grades. Growing up, he'd always say, 'If at first you don't succeed, go home.'" She ran her hands down her skirt and released a breath. "But I shouldn't have assumed. And just because you're dyslexic doesn't mean you're not smart, Sam."

"I know. I should've told you before now, though. I'm not ashamed or anything, but it didn't really seem that important because our friendship has nothing to do with it," I shrugged. "Besides, I called your dad a f—"

"Don't you dare say it again!" She interjected, smacking my leg. Behind her smile, she looked relieved that I didn't dwell on her relationship with her dad, but I understood because I didn't really want to talk about my parents either.

I raised my hands in surrender and laughed. "You're feisty today! I wasn't going to. I just wanted to see what you'd do."

She shook her head playfully and relaxed back into her chair. "So what kind of degree would you like to get?"

"I didn't really dream about going to college when I was little because my grades were so bad. This was before they found out I was dyslexic," I said.

"And now?" She egged. "Aren't you passionate about something? You like music, too. Don't deny it."

"Yeah, but that's just a hobby. I'm not like you," I said shaking my head.

"Well there's got to be something you're good at," She said thoughtfully.

"I used to draw a lot," I shrugged. "I wrote this comic when I was in the third grade about a super spy called the Blonde Chameleon, and I did a bunch of different doodles and stuff." I glanced at Mercedes, and she was giving me a queer look. "I haven't really drawn anything in years, though."

"Sam," she said slowly. "I wish you could see your face when you even start to think about drawing. It's really interesting. You should draw me something some time, okay?"

* * *

"I'm going to get another drink!"

"What?" I yelled. I could barely hear over the sound of Axl Rose beckoning me into his wild paradise. My head was starting to swim and Quinn was staying afloat on her usual mix.

"I said," Quinn stood on her toes to whisper in my ear, "I'm going to get another drink. Do you want anything?"

"I'm good," I replied.

"I'll be right back," she said, kissing my cheek. She stumbled towards the kitchen, and I backed into the nearest wall. I'd only had a couple of drinks, and though I'd been offered everything under the sun, I'd refused. I was starting to feel like that was a mistake.

All the kids here were one percenters or close to it, and every so often, they'd go slumming where the cops didn't answer 911 calls so quickly or at all. Most people would pass out here and leave when it was light out because it was safer then. The amount of liquid cash being consumed could pay someone's rent for five years in this part of town, and the money in drugs could secure a future. The kid passed out next to me took joyrides in his daddy's Jag. And there was another girl here whose brother fell from the roof at one of these things. But she was back anyways because her parents still weren't around enough and fake friends were better than nothing.

"God this is boring as hell without a drink," Santana whined. She'd appeared from nowhere and pressed close to me even though it wasn't quite that crowded. "I _hate_ being DD. Quinn owes me her first born child for this. Oh wait," she said with a devilish grin.

"How do you know Quinn again?" I asked. How in the hell did Quinn find people like this?

"I ran that little glee club of yours back in the day," she replied, looking me up and down. "I was the undisputed head bitch in charge."

"You went to McKinley?"

"I _ran_ McKinley when I was there," she corrected. "But I didn't come here to play twenty questions with you unless you're paying."

"I'm not like these other kids here, if that's what you're assuming," I said.

"Believe me, I'd already know if you were," she replied casually. "And with your five dollar haircut and dollar store jeans, Quinn must go slumming a lot more often than everyone else here does. But I can understand her fascination with poor people. Well, at least with you."

"Are you always this much of a bitch?" The words slipped from my mouth before I could contain them.

"Oh please. I'm just keeping it real," she scoffed. "Or would you rather I pretend like everyone else? None of these people give a shit about you, and they only tolerate each other because they've known each other longer."

I shook my head and looked in the direction in which Quinn had disappeared.

"Don't bother," Santana replied. "All these pretty people here are dancing to forget. You're going to be waiting a while." She snaked her fingers into my palm and pulled me from the wall, further into the crowd. "Come on."

* * *

The mood was mellowing out as the CD shuffled to a double play of _Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now_ and _Back to the Old House_. Mercedes had given up on organizing for the day, and with snow beginning to fall, Eddie had called for her to close up early. She'd whipped up some tea from the little pot they kept in the back, and we sat side by side on a rug on the floor waiting for three o'clock.

"Did you ever watch _The Addams Family_ when you were younger?" She asked.

"Absolutely!" I replied. "Christina Ricci has always been a babe."

"You know she's in her 30s now, right?" She smirked over her mug.

"Your point? She's still gorgeous." I sipped at my tea. "I'd have been her Joel all day every day."

"I died to have a family like that," she said. "Gomez and Morticia were the ultimate parents, even if they were morbid. They supported Wednesday and Pusgley endlessly, and they were so in love." She leaned her head against the chair behind her and glanced over to me. "I always wanted to be in love like that."

"You want to raise kids in a house next door to a cemetery?" I joked, and she shook her head.

"You know what I mean," she sighed and looked out the front windows, towards the falling snow. "If I were to be brutally honest with myself, I'd leave Lima the minute someone gave me an offer I couldn't refuse. I'd run like hell."

This was dangerous territory. I could feel it all over my body. Mercedes' face was inscrutable, however, but she kept folding and unfolding her hands.

"But your last boyfriend wasn't even enough to keep you in LA," I said quietly. I could barely hear the words myself over the sound of my own heartbeat mingling with the bass line in _Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want_. Her eyes flickered down as I captured one of her small hands in mine, tracing a map from her fingertips to her heart lines.

"No," she shook her head. "He wasn't. There were more important things I had to do then, and he couldn't handle that."

"I could," I whispered. I was finding it difficult to breathe properly, and I don't ever remember feeling so finely tuned to everything. This is what she feared, but she never thought that it would happen so quickly. I knew that I should leave, and she'd thank me for it. But I was weaker than she gave me credit for because leaving was the last thing I wanted to do.

I wanted her heart to whisper to God that I was hers because she was too afraid to say it out loud. I wanted to trail constellations across her skin and map them to my own private Eden. I longed to taste the plum reds of her mouth and imbibe my skin with the smell of lavender to remind her of home. I wanted to devour every inch of her beauty with eyes that had never wanted anything until today. I wanted all of this and more, and I think there was a part of her that wanted it, too.

"What?" She said, turning to me again. Her eyes looked right through me, shattering my resolve.

"What kind of offer would that be?"

She smiled, laying her head on my shoulder, and I was suddenly terrified that she could hear the drumming in my chest. "Sing to me while the sun sets and sex me all night. Wake me to see the sun rise and drive the scenic route. Read to me at truck stops and kiss me every once in a while."

"That's it?" I whispered.

"That's it," she replied.

There was never a question as to whether or not I wanted to kiss Mercedes. Had there been any doubt in my mind, it would've been easy to honor the promise I'd only sort of made a little more than two hours before. But I was drawn to her the way the earth follows the sun.

Her lips caressed mine, gliding against me like something sweet and familiar. She poured herself into me and breathed into me new life, warm and delicious. We didn't fumble like inexperienced schoolchildren or rage like angry lovers, and I wondered how I could have gone for so long in my own desert without real rain. Her eyelashes fluttered against my flushing cheeks, and her hand gripped mine to convey the words that she couldn't say.

She pulled away slowly, a sigh escaping her mouth as she disentangled herself from me. And she looked upon me with tortured eyes while I gazed at her as someone finally set free.

"You need to leave," she said, and I didn't object.

* * *

"Do you know this girl named Raphael?" I asked Santana. We were sitting on a couch somewhere in the back of the apartment. Her legs were draped across my lap and she relaxed into me while running her fingers through my hair. I don't know when I stopped dancing or for how long Santana had been pressed against me, caressing me. It felt like I'd been there for hours.

"She's my cousin and the reason why I was able to, in one way or another, "legally" buy alcohol when I was sixteen," Santana replied. "Why? You want to bone her?"

"No, no." I shook my head slowly. "I just, she looks like you."

"I'm hotter, though," she said matter-of-factly. "Anyone who's had full visitation rights to the set of rambunctious twins that live on my ribcage could attest to that."

It sounded like an invitation, but I was starting to crash already, and I wasn't willing to test it, so I stared straight ahead. "That's, uh, nice, I guess."

She dug her nails into my scalp a bit, and I winced and shot her a look. "Really?" She said angrily. I could hear a hint of jealousy in her voice.

"What?" I asked innocently.

"Okay, you know what? Let's just cut to the chase. Despite the fact that your mouth-to-face ratio is, like, way off, you still somehow manage to be cute. But Quinn told me all about you, and, make no mistake, every time you open your humongous mouth to do an impression, or moisten an enormous stamp for a lazy giant, you take one step closer to everyone seeing that you are actually a dork. Which is where I come in." Santana licked her lips and trailed her fingers on the back of my neck. "I hereby offer my services as a mistress. I wantz on them froggy lips, and I wantz on 'em now."

Santana was gorgeous, and, despite my reservations, my body was reacting to her advances. "But I'm dating Quinn," I said shaking my head. "I can't."

"Okay, you have absolutely no game," she said, pushing away. She swung her legs from my lap and pushed herself up from the couch. "You're wrong, though. You're exactly like them; you just don't know it yet. Find me when you're ready to stop pretending."

* * *

I'd struck out the minute Mercedes had given me another chance. I couldn't understand why I was unable to control myself around her, but if we were going to remain friends, I would need to figure something out.

She was refusing to answer any of my calls, and I dreaded the thought of going by Broken Records or her house because I hadn't just crossed the line; I'd run at it full force and left it behind in the dust. But she hadn't shied away from me, either, and even if she denied it, she'd felt something, too. I think that's what she was most afraid of, and she would rather distance herself from me than do something she might regret. I couldn't say I blamed her, but I wish that I was that strong.

"I wouldn't have said anything to your parents, you know?" Artie said. "You could've told me that you were sneaking out, and Sugar would've come by to get you."

"I didn't want to take the chance," I shrugged.

"I am the master of the parental units," he gloated. "Who wouldn't believe me?"

I lined up a paper football with Artie's fingermade goalposts and flicked it in his direction. It landed half an inch short. "You do look pretty honest," I said, stroking his ego.

"Damn straight," he replied with a smile. "So the next time you need an alibi—"

"Yeah, yeah," I rolled my eyes.

"Alright," he said finally, packing away the football and pulling out a stack of applications more than an inch thick. "Let's get to work."

"A-are you serious?" I asked, fumbling over my words. My tongue felt thick and I cleared my throat a few times as I stared at the pile. "That's more than I was expecting. Mrs. Pillsbury-Schuester didn't say it would be this many."

"Mrs. Pillsbury-Schuester and I thought it might be best for you to have a look at a few different ones," Artie said simply.

"Well how many schools did you apply to?" I asked him.

"36." He popped a wheelie and rocked back and forth in his chair without using his hands as a test to his balance.

"Thirty six?!" Artie gave me a crooked smile. "Why the hell would you apply to that many schools?"

"Well, I had the standard Ivy Leagues and D1 schools, just to cover the basics. Then there were the mandatory Ohio schools to appease my parents and by that time, around school number twenty seven or so, they'd kind of stopped paying attention and I was able to apply for some film schools. And if the laws of probability are correct, I'll get into at least twenty five of them and waitlisted for two or three." He set the chair down then and looked up at me.

"There's no way in hell I'm applying to that many schools," I shook my head. "My brain'll be all messed up by the time I finished the first five."

"You don't have to apply to that many, Sam," Artie assured me. "It's crazy expensive for one, and for two, you won't need to. These are the ones we picked based on what you said you liked, and Mrs. Pillsbury-Schuester thought it would be good for us to narrow them down based on other things like school size and location."

"Oh, okay." I released a sigh of relief.

"I want to help you, not give you extra stress," he said sliding the stack towards me. "Okay?"

"Yeah."

I always thought choosing a college was as easy as deciding to wear a sweater on the first cold day of fall, but as Artie and I went through each school, I began to realize how wrong I was. There was a lot that I hadn't considered, but a common theme began to surface. I definitely hadn't given up on art, even if I hadn't created any of my own in years, and I was seeking California like a lost puppy. From Artie's questioning grin, I could tell that he'd noticed it, too.

* * *

The apartment was filthy. I hadn't noticed it at first, but near sobriety did something to your perception that the fuzziness of drunken debauchery numbed. I'd seen a crowd of cockroaches drinking in the sickly sweetness of a spilled drink and the air inside was stifling with the sweat of dirty bodies. That's what had driven me outside to the rooftop, and the cold air had almost cleared my head completely. That's when I saw her.

The girl looked dead. That's the best way that I could describe her. From her pallid complexion to the stillness of the air surrounding her. Her eyes were open and they were so glossy that I could almost see the stars reflected within them, and there was a serenity in the depths of her Caribbean blues. I didn't want to get any closer to her than I already was, but I had to know for sure. I couldn't leave her like this.

I wasn't surprised that no one else seemed to notice. Santana and I had been the only truly lucid ones here, and I'd seen her leaving with some pretty girl a long time ago. It was the blackest part of the night, and I kept thinking that it was fitting for it to be so cold and dark, like the entire world was lost in mourning. She was the girl whose brother had fallen a few years ago, and it made me think of the cruelty of things that in the end God didn't discriminate.

Her family was originally from the suburbs of Boston, and she'd worked a summer internship in New York City last year. She didn't idolize the glamour of it all but spent her parents' money so that she wouldn't feel so alone. But she would give it all up with the right motivation. She saw her future self as a Pollyanna Cowgirl, and she clung to the sprig of hope that things wouldn't always be this way.

It looked like she was still breathing as I moved in closer, and I reached out a hand to touch her and hoped that she was still warm inside, that the light that guided her hadn't yet faded.

"Sylvia!" A shrill voice screamed in my ear, and a dark-skinned girl pushed past me and shook Sylvia out of her reverie.

She blinked her eyes a few times and sat up way too quickly. She breathed in deeply-too fast-and doubled over, retching the contents of her stomach onto the cinderblock tiles. I took a step back to avoid the mess, and she made eye contact with me as her friend helped her to her feet.

"What the fuck are you looking at?" She slurred towards me, rubbing her arms to guard against the cold as she marched her expensive shoes into the mess to avoid coming too close to me.

She was wearing Louboutin heels and a Cartier watch, dressed in the height of fashion. Blood diamonds dripped from her wrists and rose red rubies planted themselves in her ears. By all accounts, she was beautiful to look at but I was still struck with the hollowness in her eyes, like two black holes devouring her light.

* * *

Artie was eager to ask about Mercedes. I could see it on his face, but I refused to entertain him because I was still a bit tender from her rejection. It was necessary, but it didn't make it burn any less. I'd talked nonstop for the last ten minutes to postpone his asking, but he'd caught on and stopped responding, and now I couldn't think of anything else to say.

"So," he began, tapping his pencil against the table. "There're a lot of California schools in the 'definitely' stack. Any particular reason why?"

"I don't know. California has nice weather," I deflected.

"Okay, really?" He said. "You're going to make me drag this out?"

"Can we not, Artie?" I sighed. "Just drop it, okay?"

"Dude, you like her," he said pointedly. "Can we just say that so we can move on and figure out what you plan to do about it?"

"I'm not going to do anything about it," I replied exasperatedly, pushing back from the table. "We kissed and then she shut down, and now she's refusing to answer my calls because I'm such a dick."

"Wait, what? You kissed Mercedes?" Artie shook his head and sat up taller in his chair.

"Yeah, but it doesn't even matter because I'm dating Quinn," I shrugged. "And I need to get that hard wired up here." I pointed to my head. "Look, I don't really feel like talking about this right now. Can we just talk about the applications?" There was a desperation within me to avoid the whole damn thing, and I hoped that he understood.

"Fine," he said, backing down, "but you need to figure something out because Quinn, your _girlfriend_, is going to school in Connecticut, and you're looking at schools in California in the hopes that Mercedes, your _friend_, goes back. I'm not going to tell you what to do, but I really do hope that you figure it out. For their sakes at least. You're my boy, but I've been through a lot with those two, and the last thing either of them needs is another guy messing with their heads."

* * *

It was beginning to get light out, and people had finally begun infesting the streets below, swarming together in their dark coats and hoods. I could just make out Sylvia, however, because of her golden hair. Perhaps she'd felt me staring because she turned to gaze up at us and met my eyes for just a moment. I wondered how we appeared to her then, with her mind taken over by drugs. Did we seem like angels sent to watch over her? Or perhaps we were vultures, the harbingers of death.

Pale, white arms snaked themselves around my waist and Quinn pressed her face into my back. "I found you," she slurred.

I turned from the scene below to face her, and her eyes twinkled with bemusement like she had found the freedom she came here to get. She looked happy for once, and I realized then that I had to keep lying for just a little longer. Until a tomorrow that I dreaded. "Santana ducked out early, but I'm fine to drive."

"Are you sure?" She asked.

"I haven't had anything in a few hours. So yeah."

We found her coat in a room somewhere, and she led me through the apartment, now completely trashed, down the stairs, and to the streets below. I put my hood up to guard against the cold, but Quinn let her hair fly free like Sylvia had before her. I couldn't remember exactly how we'd gotten there, so I let Quinn lead, and I clenched her hand as she dragged me through the thickening crowd towards the car.

I dropped Quinn at home and left to catch the bus despite her pleads for me to stay. I had a lot of thinking to do, and I needed to work on my personal statement. Over the years, I had built an argument for Iron Man as the greatest superhero, and when I mentioned it to Artie, he'd thought it seemed interesting enough to flesh out. Iron Man was never my favorite. Far from it, actually. He was flawed and his motivations were oftentimes affected by a personal vendetta, but Tony Stark taught me that you don't need magic to ensure there was justice in the world. You just need the willingness to fight your own demons.

Artie asked me why choose him and not the other millionaire playboy, Bruce Wayne, and I'd thought about that, too. There was something spellbinding in the way that Tony wasn't afraid for people to know it was him. Most people called it arrogance, but for me it was the purest form of heroism. Yes, it was insane, but it was also brave. You open yourself up to every form of criticism and snatch away the net of safety that anonymity provides. He's not someone that everyman could be; he's someone that you have to be exceptional to be.

The streets were quiet around my house, not like the infestation of rich kids in Lima Heights Adjacent, but this was more unsettling. I didn't bother to creep home like I would have before because my parents weren't paying attention anymore, and I no longer had the energy to pretend. Mom was sitting at the dining table when I entered, and she met me with sleepless eyes.

"Sam," she said menacingly, pushing herself up from the table. "Where the hell have you been all night?"

"I'm sorry I didn't call," I replied. "I've been doing some thinking, but I'm really tired, Mom. Can we talk about this later? Please."

She walked up slowly and blinked back tears, then ran her hands along the arms of my jacket. "I just have to make sure you're real, that you're still here," she mumbled.

My mother was eccentric, but this was not normal. "Mom? Are you okay?" I asked as she began to clench me tighter.

"What the fuck were you thinking?" She was beginning to become hysterical. "Do you have any idea, any idea, how completely out of my mind I was with worry?! Did you even care?"

"I'm fine, Mom. I'm here. I just want to go to bed." I avoided her stare. I just wanted to sleep.

"I thought you were dead!" She began shaking me, and I wrapped my arms around her to calm her. The look she gave me was poisonous. "You disappear for hours, won't answer the phone, and I don't know if you're alive or dead!"

"Mom!" I yelled. "Stop! Look at me!" I held her tightly and looked into her eyes, and she finally gave in. Her body relaxed into mine, and she began sobbing into my shirt.

"Don't ever do this to me again," she sobbed. "I was planning for your funeral! You just can't do things like this to the people who love you so much."

"I know, Mom, and I'm sorry that you were so worried. I'm here now. I'm safe," I assured her.

Where was Dad right now? Probably back in Tennessee. Yes, Grandma Jean needed him, but he should have known better than to leave Mom like this. When I came home late last November, my punishment was swift and relatively painless. There wasn't a lot of yelling or anger, even. My parents were mostly disappointed, both with me and themselves for not being there. But they weathered that storm together. Dad's absence was notable in Mom's dealing with this situation. And my heart throbbed at the thought of her waiting alone all night for me to return.

"Mom?" I loosened my grip on her so that I could push back and see her more clearly. "Where's Dad?"

She released me and grabbed my hand, not bothering to wipe away the tears still streaming down her face. She was wrestling with herself to talk to me. I could tell by her expression. Then she sighed and squeezed my hand. "Your father's in Tennessee, Sam. Grandma Jean," she paused and took a breath. "Your grandmother passed away last night."

* * *

AN: This chapter is titled The Smiths or _Super Rich Kids_ based on the songs by the band The Smiths and the song by Frank Ocean, respectively.

Songs featured in this chapter include "Welcome to the Jungle" by Guns N' Roses; "Hotel California" by the Eagles; and "There Is a Light That Never Goes Out," "Back To The Old House," "Ask," "Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now," "Shoplifters of the World Unite," and "Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want"all from _Louder Than Bombs_, The Smiths compilation album.

Pop culture found in this chapter includes Looney Toons, _Back to the Future, American Graffiti_, British Brat Packers, Iggy Pop, David Bowie, the Rolling Stones, Oasis, The Cure, Lunar New Year, Pitch Perfect, _The Addams Family_, the Garden of Eden, _The Bell Jar_ by Sylvia Plath, Louboutin, Cartier, _A Clockwork Orange_ by Anthony Burgess, blood diamonds, Iron Man, and Batman.

So…I'm pretty sure I accidentally lied to you all and said that I would write much more often. I'm not really sure what happened because it's been about four months or so. My apologies. I have this entire thing mapped out, but this journey has been a true test of writing for me. I used to criticize and whine for those writers I loved to update, but now I understand the other side of that coin. So I won't make anymore promises, but I already know how this will end, and in time I'll get there. I can promise that. Perhaps I'll post the story that this is based on, though I'm completely changing the ending. If I ever get around to doing that, then you'd understand why.

There's a lot of meta in most of these chapters, but this one in particular strikes me. I had originally planned to get this out sooner because it was supposed to be a filler chapter in preparation for the death chapter that's coming up next. I actually started working on this and have had about 75% of it completed for the last few months. But I couldn't bring myself to finish it for one reason or another until last night and today. I added Sylvia in this morning. Sylvia is this whole thing wrapped into a tiny package. She's immersed in this world, and there are times in which her light goes dim, but the person she wants to be, her higher self, keeps finding a way out. That's why she let her hair down at the ground level, unlike most of the others. Sam would like to believe that he's different, but we're learning that he's more similar to the super rich kids than he's comfortable being. This one chapter has become the allegory for the whole damn story, and I didn't plan it that way. I like it when things like this happen.

These characters are an extension of myself in one way or another, and not just because this story is playing out in my mind. I put a bit more of myself into this chapter. While I was drunk once, I told the guy with whom I was infatuated with at the time that he set my loins on fire because I was in a religion class with him and we'd been discussing the subject. I didn't recognize that I should have said womb or at the very least vagina. But he was a good sport about it, and we had an on-again-off-again thing for a while after that. The story of the Bugs Bunny drawing is an almost exact recall from the conversation between my mother and me when I was in the sixth grade. I ended up throwing it away sometime after that. The only evidence I have left from those days is a picture of Daffy Duck. I stopped seriously pursuing art when I was in about the eighth grade, though. And not just because of my mother. There wasn't much support from anyone in that venture, and I hadn't yet learned how to lean on myself. But it's stories like that which make me know that I will fully support my future children, whatever their passions. There are too many damaged adults in this world. I'm one of them. I'm a product of them. But I will break the cycle if I can.

Mind my grammar and any spelling errors. I hope that you're enjoying it! Please comment and critique! Thanks so much!


	8. What Sarah Said or You Are A Tourist

I was conflicted going back to Tennessee for an entire week. It didn't feel the same returning as it did when we drove away last summer. I was scared and angry then, and I was now, too, but for the opposite reason. Over the last six months, I had been so concerned with establishing myself at McKinley that I had all but abandoned some of the very best friendships I'd ever had, and I couldn't even find a good reason why. In that time, I'd only visited Tennessee once a few weeks ago days after my disastrous visit with Mercedes, and I was protected from any encounters with former friends by our nearly constant presence in the hospital. Grandma had been asking for us for a few days, and Dad had finally obliged. He hated for us to see her like that, but he knew that it was important for us to get a chance to say goodbye. Just in case.

Dad was pacing in the waiting room when we arrived, and he hugged Mom tightly when he saw us. Stacey held his hand when he let go, and Stevie waited with baited breath for news. But I felt far away.

"She's stable," Dad reassured us. "She's sleeping right now. They'll let us in in groups of three so that we don't overwhelm her or disturb the other person in her room."

He had bags beneath his eyes, and he ran his free hand over his face and through his hair. He yawned loudly, and I wondered when was the last time he'd slept. Dad looked older than I'd ever seen him before, and for the first time it really hit me that his mother was dying.

"Can I go first?" Stacey begged. She'd been asking to be the first to see Grandma since Louisville.

"Sure," Dad replied with a warm smile. "Sam, can you stay here with Stevie?"

I nodded, and Dad, Mom, and Stacey made their way out the door and down the hall. I plopped down in the first available chair, and Stevie settled in beside me. I hated hospitals. I hated the smell of 409 and the year-old magazines they kept in the waiting room. Stevie was restless beside me as he bounced from one side to the other to the soundtrack of the TV's white noise, and I? Well I was focusing hard on my shoes.

A man in purple Adidas kept crossing in front of me, glancing at his watch every few minutes. I took a quick survey around me, and most people were staring hard at the ground in front of them. A small family to my left had a balloon with the words _It's A Girl!_ emblazoned in pink. All waiting.

Mom came back with Stacey about twenty minutes later and traded her for Stevie. Stacey laid her head on me, and I stroked her hair.

"Was Grandma still asleep?" I asked.

"Yeah," she whispered. "Daddy tried to wake her up, but she couldn't keep her eyes open. She had all these strings everywhere, but Daddy said that they were helping her."

I was finding it hard to drum up a lot of memories of my grandmother; I saw a smile here and could hear her faint laughter there, and I blamed it on the hospital. On this stifling little room full of hope and hopelessness, and I took a deep breath to settle myself. How many had I already taken today? A nurse appeared at the doorway, and everyone lifted their heads as the man in the purple Adidas disappeared with him down the hall.

"Sam," Mom was saying a few minutes later. "I'll stay here with your brother and sister, and you can go on. It's room 412."

And it wasn't until then that I realized that I didn't want to see her that way, and it had everything to do with love and the way she'd smiled at me during Thanksgiving. And I didn't want my last memory of my grandmother to be of her hooked up to a bunch of machines, a ghost of the woman I knew. I had that happen to me once before, and I never wanted that again.

"No, Mom. I can't." I shook my head quickly.

She didn't press me for reasons but stared at me intently before finally nodding and handing over Stevie. She then went back out and down the hall.

We lived in that waiting room for nearly 48 hours until the minutiae of life pulled us away again. That would turn out to be the last time I had to see my grandmother alive.

Dad was a mess in the days leading up to the funeral, though it was hard to tell from an outsider's perspective. He kept himself busy. He was out everyday picking out the perfect flowers and chatting with the funeral home. He wrote up the announcement for the papers and made all the phone calls to friends and loved ones. As Grandma's only child, he didn't trust anyone else to make the funeral perfect. But it was the in-between moments that showed his fragility and in how little he allowed himself to be comforted. It was the guilt he felt the morning after he'd finally gotten a good night's sleep. He was a quiet storm, and we treaded softly around him.

Dad pushed Mom away, and she gave him his space because he had done the same for her when Sawyer died, and she made her way back to a semi-normal existence in her own time. So she didn't push back; she owed him that. She was different here, too, and some of the weight she carried in Lima seemed to be lifted. Being away from home took a toll on her. She grew up just outside of Nashville, and when we lived here, she'd visit a few times a month to reminisce. She was close to friends and family and the demons that created her. I think that her loneliness in Lima is what made her retreat into herself so much. So while we came for the funeral, she came to be renewed.

There was a strange sort of pep in her step that Monday, even though she and I had driven for six and a half hours on little sleep that Sunday, and she smiled at me with an unnatural calm when I finally made it downstairs that morning. She was finishing up breakfast, and I asked if she needed any help.

"You can set the table," she replied.

I nodded and began pulling dishes out of the overhead cabinet. We worked in silence as the rest of our family milled in and out of the kitchen around us.

"Can you put this on the table?" She asked, pointing to a cast iron skillet full of eggs and hash. "I'm just going to grab your brother and sister."

She left the kitchen, I transported the pan, and Stacey and Stevie soon came running in with damp hands.

"Where's Dad?" I asked as we settled at the table. Stevie squirmed around waiting for Mom to say the word that we could eat.

"He's coming," she said with a smile. She began filling our plates, and I started to help, but she stopped me. "I got it," was all she said.

When she was finished serving everyone, we waited impatiently for Dad to join us while Stevie complained that the food was getting cold. Mom shushed him then pushed back from the table.

"I'll be right back."

She put on a pot of coffee before disappearing through the doorway.

Stevie snuck bits of hash and slumped in his seat. "I'm hungry," he whined.

"Mommy said to wait for Daddy," Stacey chastised.

Stevie glared at her. "Dad doesn't even _care_," he countered and crossed his arms. "And neither do I."

"You're being rude," she pouted. "I'm telling Mommy!"

"I. Don't. Care," Stevie replied, pushing back from the table.

I stared at my little brother, and he looked angry and disappointed. Dad wasn't just pushing away Mom; he was detaching from everyone. He had been for months before Grandma had even gotten sick. I was old enough to handle it and Stacey was young enough to forgive more easily, but Stevie was caught in the middle between maintaining hope and losing it. Dad was still his biggest hero, and he was barely there. And I was doing a shitty job at being an older brother to him.

"Stevie I—" I began, and he stared at me with eyes full of the worst kind of need, but Mom interrupted before I could finish, and he turned away.

"Okay, okay," she said. "We can eat now."

Dad followed behind sluggishly and stopped to pour himself a cup of coffee before coming to the table.

"Mommy!" Stacey started as soon as Mom sat down. "Stevie said he didn't care and tried to eat when you were gone."

"Tattle tale," Stevie scowled then glared at his plate and took quick bites.

"It's fine, Stacey," Mom replied, and Stacey huffed before eating.

It's fine. That was the ultimate motto for dismissiveness. Anyone could see that things were _not_ fine, but we kept on like they were. Dad drained his coffee cup and got up to make another without touching his food. Stevie stared into his lap and played with his thumbs, refusing to look at anyone. Stacey had gotten over her brief touchiness and was watching everyone and chattering on with childish fascination. Mom maintained her eerie composure, and I wondered just what the hell was wrong with this picture.

"We're going to visit Sawyer this morning," Mom said when Dad finally sat back down. So this is why she was different this morning. She had been away for almost six months, and it had never occurred to me until now that that might have something to do with how strange she'd become in Lima. "And your father is going to talk with the director about your grandmother's plot."

"Excuse me," Dad said, getting up from the table. "I'm just, just going to get a bit of paperwork together." He left the kitchen quickly, and we all stared after him.

"Can I be excused, too?" Stevie asked, breaking our concentration.

"No," Mom replied, and he crossed his arms again and slumped in his seat.

Stacey continued her seven year old banter, and Mom listened like she was hearing the goddamn Gettysburg Address or some shit.

"What the hell, Mom?" I burst out. Everyone jerked their heads in my direction, and my siblings looked at me with eyes the size of saucers. "Can't you see how upset he is?" I pointed towards Stevie, and he sank into his chair like I'd shot an AK-47 in his direction. "What difference does it make for him to have a few minutes to himself before we go?"

"The meal is not over, and we don't leave the table until the meal is over," Mom stated.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" I slammed my hands onto the table and pushed my chair back.

"Stop yelling at Mommy!" Stacey suddenly screamed. She balled her little hands into fists and her eyes brimmed with tears.

"It's fine, Stacey," Mom replied calmly.

"It is _not_ fine!" I yelled back and stood up so quickly that my chair clattered to the floor. Stevie cowered in his chair. "Stop saying it's fine!" Stacey pressed her hands to her ears and began sobbing, and Mom reached out to comfort her.

"Sit down, Samuel," She said slowly. "We are going to finish this meal as a family."

"Well if you hadn't noticed, Mom," I hissed back, "Dad left the table, and it didn't even faze you. Stevie, your living, breathing, nine year old son, is falling apart right in front of your eyes, and you don't give a damn! You haven't really cared about any of us since Sawyer died!"

"That is enough, Sam!"

Dad had reappeared from nowhere and stood a few feet behind me in the kitchen. His fist was balled on the counter, and there was a fire behind his eyes that let me know that I was on very dangerous ground, but he otherwise looked exhausted. "You are dismissed from this meal. There's no reason for you to frighten your brother and sister to prove a point."

I didn't argue. Mom looked devastated like I'd clawed into some still throbbing wound. I looked at Stacey, who was crying in Mom's arms, and Stevie, who was biting back tears, and I felt horrible. I picked up my chair and released my anger. "I'm sorry," I said quickly and rushed from the room.

Stevie came to my room fifteen minutes later to let me know that we were heading to the cemetery. He gazed at me shyly like he was afraid that I might explode again, and I motioned for him to come in. He reluctantly walked over and sat on the bed next to me.

"I'm sorry about breakfast," I said quietly. "I really didn't mean any of it." He kicked his feet but didn't look at me. "Mom loves you, okay?"

He nodded quickly and slid off the bed, and I pushed myself off and followed him out to the car.

It was a very quiet ride out to the cemetery. Stevie and Mom stared out the window, and Mom held tightly to a bouquet of wildflowers in her hand. Dad didn't take his eyes off of the road, and Stacey created scenarios of a happy family with her dolls. I texted Artie about why I wasn't in school and then had to respond to a flurry of texts from Quinn and the rest of the Glee Club. Mixed in with them was a text from Emma saying that she'd heard about my grandmother and that she was sorry. I cut my phone off when we finally parked.

Dad sighed as he stared around at the grounds which sprawled out the length of a football field in front of us. He didn't look ready for this in any form.

"I'll just go and chat with Mr. Alighieri, and he'll show me everything." He transferred a manila envelope full of paperwork from one hand to the other. He refused to use any vocabulary that actually dealt with Grandma's death. If he could, he'd fast forward to a year from now when the pain was just a dull ache that you could dispel with one happy thought. "You guys go on ahead, and I'll be there in a bit."

He turned away then and marched towards a small gray building on the other side of the parking lot, and Mom grasped Stacey's and Stevie's hands and led us towards Sawyer's final resting place.

Mom was still sore about Sawyer's death, and I'm not sure that any force on this earth or beyond besides one that returned him could ever help her fill the void that he'd left behind. It wasn't true that she didn't care about the rest of us. She did love us in her own way, but our love would never be enough, and it was something that I'm not sure that any of us would ever really understand. Dad had to have some idea to love Mom the way that he did, in spite of the way she loved us back.

She had named Sawyer after her brother who died when he was just 13, and when her son was taken away, she dissolved into her own madness. She rarely ever mentioned my uncle, and I only learned of him through some pictures she kept in her first scrapbook. I first asked about them when I was about six, and she smiled and told me that that was her brother and that she had named Sawyer after him. She told me that he'd died in an offhand sort of way and that was when she began scrapbooking.

Sawyer's tombstone still looked fresh even though it was nearly eight years old, and Mom knelt down to remove a few leaves off of the plot. She pulled out the long dead flowers from his vase and replaced it with the fresh wildflowers she carried.

"I think that he would have loved these," she said quietly. And I agreed.

He had longed to take a Thoreauvian journey and always stopped to admire the wonders of the natural world. He tried to live in harmony with the earth and sent more love into the world than the world deserved. And that, I supposed, was the most tragic part of his death.

* * *

I was asleep when my parents got the call, and Dad rushed in my room to wake me. I could see how panicked he was from the size of his eyes, and Mom was hysterically crying from downstairs somewhere.

"Hurry up and grab your jacket," he said in an unnaturally shrill voice, but he was trying to stay calm.

"What's going on?" I asked groggily, trying to wipe the sleep from my eyes.

"Sawyer's in the hospital," Dad said quickly.

My heart nearly skipped a beat as his words settled over me, and I rushed to put shoes on as he tried to get a jacket on Stevie. "Is he going to be okay?" I asked quietly, and he gnawed on his lip before answering.

"I-I don't know," he admitted.

Mom cried all the way to Grandma's house, and Dad worked to calm her down. She was frightening Stevie and Stacey, and he was nervous that they might need to sedate her if she was still this unhinged at the hospital. I didn't want to admit it, but I was terrified.

Grandma ran out to the car to meet us, and Dad told me to help watch my siblings while they were out.

"I want to go, too!" I protested at his car window, and he firmly told me no. So I watched them drive away, and Grandma forced me inside as the taillights of our car faded down the street.

* * *

Mom began telling Sawyer about our new house in Lima and how much he'd love Ohio, and Stacey, Stevie, and I walked a bit farther down to give her a moment alone.

"Why can't we still live here?" Stacey asked as we strolled between plots.

"I don't know," I admitted, and I could see what she meant. Yes, Dad was mourning; we were, too, but this was our home.

* * *

Dad brought us to the hospital late the next evening, and I learned what had happened as he tried to whisper the story to Grandma so that I wouldn't hear, but I sat as quietly as I could so that I would know everything. His voice cracked a few times as he relayed it to her, and I remember how she clutched at her chest and the tears that flowed down her cheeks as she held onto a tiny and squirming Stacey.

Sawyer was a resident assistant in his dorm. He'd taken the job because he loved to help people and because the RA he'd had his freshman year was horrible. He'd tell me little stories about how his RA, Ryan, never actually did his job and that if he had that job, he'd be the best. I didn't doubt for a second that everyone would love him. And they did, or at least that's the impression that I got from the sheer number of people that attended his funeral. It was his love of people that ultimately killed him and his desire for people to feel his love.

He was making his rounds that Wednesday night in the dorm that hosted parties throughout the week. They put him there for his charisma and the way that he could move people, because, as his dean would later say, "It took a special person to work in that building." People were rowdier than normal with it being the week before Spring Break and all, and so the party went on into the night later than it usually did. A few of his friends would speak at his funeral and say how he checked on everyone that night that looked like they needed some help, and he didn't hesitate to walk someone back to their room or fetch them a glass of water.

At around two A.M. he happened upon a group in the middle of a one-sided struggle. One of the guys, a rugby player named Dodge Turner, was trying to convince a heavily intoxicated girl named Molly to come back to his place. Two of his friends were trying to pull him away, but he kept pushing them off and reaching for her. Molly was rebuffing his advances, but Dodge became only more persistent and insistent.

There was never any question about Sawyer intervening because that's the type of person that he was. He worked in the toughest dorm on campus because that's where he could do the most good. They said that he tried talking to Dodge and positioned himself between him and Molly to help her feel protected, but Dodge became more enraged and tried several times to go around my brother. When he reached around and grabbed Molly by the arm, Sawyer had had enough and pushed Dodge away from her. He told Dodge's friends to get him out of there and put his arm around Molly to lead her back to her dorm.

Afterwards, his friends couldn't recall exactly how it had happened, but Dodge became so infuriated watching Sawyer walk away with Molly that he somehow broke their grip. He tapped my brother on the shoulder, and Sawyer told him to go cool down right before Dodge's fist slammed into his face. He flew into the concrete wall behind him, his head slamming against the bricks, and he crumpled to the ground before anyone knew what had happened.

* * *

"I don't want to move back here," Stevie said.

"Why not?" I asked him.

"I just don't." He kicked a rock and started walking back towards Mom, and Stacey and I watched him go for a moment before heading that way, too.

"Hey," I said, slowing my pace. "I'm sorry about this morning. I didn't mean it, and I didn't mean to scare you."

She looked up at me with her big eyes and squeezed my hand. "It's okay. I know you're sad. I am, too."

I considered her for a moment before smiling and squeezing her hand back. "You are the smartest person I know."

* * *

If every other memory were burned from my mind, I could never forget the way he looked all frozen and bandaged and _dead_ even though his chest was still rising and falling. I learned later that the ventilator next to his bed was responsible for most of the movement. Sawyer's head was wrapped in such thick layers of bandages he looked like he was wearing a turban, and his face was black with bruising. He didn't look like himself, and I was scared to touch him because I didn't want to break him further, but I worked myself up to grasping his fingers which already felt cold.

He wore thick bandages because they'd had to perform surgery in an attempt to stop the swelling of his brain. They induced a coma and over three days, they eventually resorted to removing pieces of his skull in a last ditch effort to give his continually swelling brain more room. Mom stayed by his side every moment that she was allowed and was nearly sedated on multiple occasions, but Dad was able to calm her. Our neighbor, Georgia, who he was dating at the time, was another inconsolable mess, and I watched from the sidelines as my once vibrant and idealistic brother slipped away.

The last moment that I spent with him was on that third day a short while after his last surgery. Dad had stepped out with the doctor while Mom was sleeping in the chair beside Sawyer's bed. I crept to the door to eavesdrop and caught snatches of the conversation.

"…essentially brain dead…" The sad, concerned voice of the doctor spoke.

"But his…swelling…" Dad replied in panicked tones.

"…ventilator...hard decision…"

The doctor's voice caught a bit and he apologized. Dad let out what sounded like a sob, and I moved away from the door and back to Sawyer's bed.

"Please, Sawyer, please!" I pleaded softly and squeezed his hand. "Just open your eyes."

The expelling of air from the ventilator was the only response. It was an impossible request. One that I knew that he would never fulfill.

Mom stirred in her sleep then and focused her glazed eyes on me. She reached out a hand and brushed the hair from my eyes, then grasping my hand, she whispered "Sawyer" before closing her eyes again and falling back asleep.

I worked on my comic all day the next day to take my mind off of things and hoped against hope that Sawyer would come home and read it. When Dad told me he was gone, I finished the panel I was working on and gathered every issue together. And when I marched up to his casket later that week, I pressed them into his palm and sent them on with the only person who'd appreciated them.

* * *

Stevie was sitting with Mom when Stacie and I finally walked up, and she beckoned us to join them. I opted to stand as she told them about what a great person Sawyer was and about his final sacrifice. Dad was moving slowly through the aisles, making his way over to us. He had a stern expression on his face, and I felt sorry that we were here again.

We stayed for an hour or so until Mom had exhausted all words and was beginning to feel the burn of his death again. Dad helped her up and back to the car without a word. He was good at this and could consol Mom for a lifetime, but he didn't know how to deal when the role was reversed. So he ate his feelings and dealt with them on his own.

Mom obsessively cleaned the rest of the day and took us around town to remove thoughts of death from our minds. We began entertaining a stream of friends and family, something for which I was grateful. I had begged my parents to let me come back six months ago, and I'd adapted when I couldn't. But being back now was different. Grandma was gone, and Dad was pushing everyone away. Mom seemed better, but it felt forced. Stevie was angry, Stacey was coping, and I felt extremely alone. We were all suffering here.

I put my phone on silent in an effort to better focus on the present, but it didn't stop my friends from enquiring about me, and I only responded to text messages from Artie, Quinn, and eventually Mercedes after Artie had clued her in. And I felt better about the genuine relationships I was building in Lima. This was in stark contrast to how Nashville made me feel. By Tuesday, Mom had started sending me on errands for little things and telling me to be gone for hours in an effort to get me to explore and enjoy home again, but I felt like an imposter.

"We need some more toilet paper, Sam," Mom said, handing me her keys and forty dollars that afternoon. "Get the nice kind. No rush, though." She winked as I took the money. I rolled my eyes and slumped out the door, feeling her smile on my back as I got into the car and drove down the street.

I made a beeline down the toiletries aisle at the closest convenience store to Grandma Jean's house and grabbed two packs of Charmin then went straight to the counter.

"Good afternoon," the girl at the register said, as I placed the toilet paper down and scanned the magazines. I gave a quick smile and continued browsing. "Sam?" She asked. I looked back up and met the eyes of Sarah, a girl that I had known for most of my life who lived a block from Grandma Jean. She was three years older than me, and I had had the biggest crush on her before dating Emma. "Oh my God! I thought it was you," she beamed.

"Hey, Sarah," I replied, rocking back and forth on my heels. I secretly hoped that she wouldn't pry into my life in the last six months and that this toiletry trip would end quickly.

"Geez, it's been, what, last summer since I last saw you?" She said her eyes wide. "How have you been?"

"Good," I replied. "Really good." She was holding my toilet paper hostage, and I wondered how the Blonde Chameleon would've handled this situation. He could have gotten in and out with ease. No. That's bullshit. He wouldn't be hiding from his old friends in the first place. "I'll be graduating in a few months," I forced out.

"That's great to hear." Her face lit up with a smile, but it faded a moment later. "I'm really sorry about your Grandma," she said more solemnly. "I really liked her."

"Yeah, me, too," I replied. "Thanks."

"How's your dad holding up?" She asked.

I shrugged. "He's surviving, but he won't really talk to anyone about it. I guess I can understand."

"And you?"

"I'm fine." I gave a small smile, and Sarah nodded knowingly. She was there when Sawyer died, so she wasn't a stranger to the way my family handled losing somebody.

"So how long are you in town?" She asked, attempting to lighten things.

"We leave out on Sunday. The wake is tomorrow, and the funeral is Thursday. We're staying the weekend to see family and such. You know how that goes," I shrugged.

She nodded. "Well we should find some time to catch up a bit. God, it's been forever since I've seen you!"

"We could try, but this week's pretty busy, you know?" I said slowly.

"Yeah. I understand," she began, "but if you get some free time tonight, we can go out to eat and then go back to my place after. I'll make you the best cup of coffee or tea. Whichever you want, and then we can just talk for a while," she offered.

"Uh, sure," I replied.

She reached for my hand, pulling my arm to rest on top of the counter. Then she pulled out a Sharpie and wrote her number down. "I figured you'd probably forgotten my number since we haven't talked in ages." She pursed her lips and blew on my palm to dry it before releasing me.

"Actually," I said glancing at the navy mess on my hand, "I still have your number in my phone."

She laughed a bit. "Well in any case give me a call if your schedule opens up." She waited until I agreed and finally allowed me to pay for the toilet paper.

Mom was sitting on the porch with Stacey when I arrived back at Grandma Jean's house, and she stitched her brows together.

"I thought you'd be out for a while," she said questioningly.

"I'm pretty tired Mom," I lied then smiled down at Stacey. "How are you, squirt?" I messed her hair, and she batted my hands away.

"Stop it, Sammy!" She said, leaning in closer to Mom. "I don't want knots!"

"Well excuse me!" I feigned shock and disappointment, but Stacey just leaned further into Mom so that she was resting across her lap.

"She's sad," Mom mouthed to me as she stroked Stacey's hair.

And she did look upset. She wasn't crying, but she didn't have her usual spark either. The gravity of things was finally starting to wear her down. I sat down beside them and reached to comfort her but thought better of it and folded my hands into my lap. "I'm sorry, Stacey," I said sincerely. "I miss her, too." She turned her face away from me for a moment. "But I think she's happy now. She's not sick anymore."

A fat tear rolled down her nose bridge and into Mom's lap, and Stacey reached to wipe it away. "Did Grandma go to Heaven?" She asked.

I stared up at Mom, and she was looking back at me, and her eyes were wide and glossy. Stacey was a baby when my family stopped attending church and had grown up without the teachings of organized religion. We didn't talk God at home very often, but I still thought about God and everything that goes with living in the world. And the remnants of those years I spent going to church still influenced my actions. But Stacey had never had this, and Stevie was probably too young to remember it. They had grown up a practically godless life with no one to help them answer the question of whether God was real or not, and I hated my parents in that moment for never giving them the tools to quell their fears. Because even if God was just a fantasy that they might later reject, God was a fantasy that I would rather know than not, and they deserved the same comfort.

"Stacey, I—" Mom began, but I cut her off.

"Yes, Stacey," I said. "Grandma's in Heaven."

I reached for her then and pulled her from Mom's lap. My mother looked small and conflicted as I hoisted Stacey up and marched her into the house. I laid her onto her bed and kissed her forehead then answered every burning question she could muster. It was an hour before she was too exhausted to continue, and I allowed her to get some sleep.

Mom had moved to the porch swing when I reemerged from the house, and she wrapped her arms around herself as she turned to look at me.

"I'm going out," I said. I needed some time and something to help me clear my head. "I'll be back later."

She didn't try to stop me as I got in the car and drove away. I glanced at the smudged number on my palm then scrolled through the contacts on my phone until I was at Sarah French.

"My schedule just opened up," I said when she answered. "Let's meet at Etch at seven, okay?"

Sarah insisted on paying for dinner. Partly because she felt so awful about why I was back home and partly because living with Freddie, her twenty nine year old chef boyfriend, allowed her to save a lot of money. Her place was a condo downtown, and I couldn't help but think that Quinn's friends would be in love. She turned on _The Dark Side of the Moon_ album and made me a coffee to rival Starbucks. Then we settled in with her cats, Piper and Orion, to catch up on each other's lives.

She was taking a few classes at Nashville State Community College while working at the convenience store a few hours a week. She didn't think that she was ready for a four year school yet, and Freddie was really supportive. They'd already talked marriage, and her parents were starting to come around to the idea of Freddie actually sticking around. Her brother, Nathan, had joined the Air Force and was stationed in Germany, and she was going to see him in July. Last year, her older sister, Georgia, had graduated at the top of her class at Harvard Medical School with a specialization in Neurosurgery, and she had already performed a few successful surgeries.

I told her about school and about Artie, Quinn, and Mercedes. I reluctantly admitted my fall from grace in football and my fears for my low SAT score. I talked about my parents and the effects their anger had on our family, and I talked about my siblings but particularly Sawyer. She smiled through it all and laughed when I did and sometimes when I didn't. She smiled the biggest about Sawyer because while I'd had eyes for her, she'd had a heart for him, even though he was dating Georgia.

She pulled her brown curls into a messy bun and gave me a queer smile when I'd finally finished rambling.

"What?" I asked.

"Sawyer would've kicked your ass over football," she laughed.

"I know," I said shaking my head. "To be honest, I don't think I'd have ever jeopardized myself if he had anything to say about it."

She nodded and stared at me with a question behind her eyes. "What?" I asked exasperatedly. "You've been giving me the strangest looks. Just say it."

"You've changed," she said simply.

"Is that a good thing?" I sat my empty mug down on the table and stroked Piper before she jumped to the floor.

"I don't know," she shrugged. "You sound exhausted. When was the last time you read a comic book or played your guitar, Sam? You were obsessed with those things before you left. And even though you hated Emma for not having sex—"

"I didn't hate her," I cut in.

"Please. You and I used to talk every time you came home, and you had blue balls, Sam." Sarah smiled. "But you would never cheat on her. I don't know. You're not the same nerdy kid that used to follow me around with puppy dog eyes. That's for damn sure."

I didn't feel any different. I had talked with Mercedes about the Blonde Chameleon a few weeks ago. Artie and I played video games. I played guitar in Glee Club regularly. But somehow I knew she was right, and it terrified me. And it wasn't just about my getting booted from football. It was my fears of not getting into college and how I couldn't love Quinn the way she needed to be loved. It was how I couldn't be a role model for my younger siblings and the lies my parents told me. It was the parts of me that were falling apart at the seams and the realization that for the first time in my life since the sixth grade, I no longer had it all together. I didn't feel any different, but Sarah was right, and I wasn't the same.

Sarah went to refill our cups and I allowed myself to be taken towards my last gig on Clare Torry's instructions. _If you can hear this whispering you are dying._ _I never said I was frightened of dying_. I just never said that I wasn't.

She placed the cup down in front of me, and I smiled up at her and chewed on my lip. "So how's everyone else around here? I've kind of boarded myself away from the world these last two days. Seeing so many family members makes it easier to hide, though."

"They're good," she said with a smile. "The neighborhood's pretty much the same. You left and then I moved out, but you know how everyone is. They get stuck." She shrugged her shoulders. "But you didn't. I guess it is a good thing, even if it'll take you a while to get to the good. Anyone in particular you wanted to know about?"

"How's Cache?"

"He's fine. He got into Penn State, and his mom is freaking out. She is not willing to let that boy go, but she'll get over it." Sarah took a sip, and I nodded. "Anybody else?"

"Hmm," I clicked my teeth together a bit and took a breath before finally asking about who I'd really wanted to hear about. "Have you seen Emma lately at all? We stopped talking when I told her that I was dating someone else, but she texted me to send her condolences yesterday."

"I saw her last week, actually," Sarah cut her eyes away and began gulping her tea.

"What? She's okay, isn't she?" I laughed a bit. "She wasn't too shy to say hello? You two became pretty good friends despite my efforts to stop it. I still haven't forgiven you for telling her about me streaking in your backyard."

"You have to admit that that was hilarious!" She laughed.

"I will never forgive you," I replied, crossing my arms.

She shook her head then became more serious. "Emma and I were never really good friends, and she did say hi, but we kind of stopped talking a few months ago, too," Sarah replied with a nervous laugh, and I motioned for her to continue. "Well, it's just, she's pregnant, Sam. She's a few months along."

I didn't know what I expected to feel, but anger wasn't it because I had given up that relationship long before we'd actually ended it. But somewhere inside I knew that I was mad at Emma because she'd changed her mind about waiting and had found somebody she thought she loved too quickly after me.

"I didn't want to be the bearer of bad news. I wasn't going to tell you at first, but I don't know. I thought you'd want to know," Sarah said quietly.

I had a lot of questions that I wanted to ask, but those were answers that I didn't deserve to know. Wasn't that what I'd wanted before? We were never great together, and I'd released a sigh of relief the moment we'd driven away while she'd stood there in the dust of our car and watched me leave with tears in her eyes. The last things I'd said were how disappointed I was in our relationship while she told me that she loved me. Was I expecting her to never have anyone after me? Of course not, and yet, somehow, that's how I felt.

"Was she happy?" I asked finally.

Sarah looked back up at me. "I think she was."

"Good."

She turned up the volume on _Money_ and tapped her foot along to the beat. "Freddie says that this is his theme song," she said with a smile.

"Why?"

"He says that it's a reminder to be a good person. He calls it his Bible in six minutes. He just doesn't like going to church." She hummed along and nudged me with her foot. "Are you going to visit PA while you're here?"

I shook my head. "I don't really want to go. It won't feel like it's mine anymore. You know what I mean?"

"Yeah, I do," she nodded. "But I don't think that's what's happening with you. You're just being a pussy."

I stared her down, and she just shrugged her shoulders. "You know, I always hated talking to you, Sarah," I said, shaking my head. "If I wasn't trying so hard to get in your pants all those years, I don't think I'd have ever talked to you."

She smiled a crooked smile. "Why, Sam, you get so much hotter when you're honest. If you're like this all the time, you just might make me change my mind about Freddie, and if your ass is still as cute as it was the day you ran through my backyard then we can really talk. When's your birthday again?" I knotted up my mouth and threw a pillow at her face while she laughed. "But seriously," she said after she'd finally caught her breath. "I think you should visit for old time sake. I'll even go with you if you're too chicken shit to go alone."

I gnawed on the skin inside of my bottom lip for a moment. "I'll think about it," I said.

I hung around her house until it was nearly midnight, and we listened to _Dark Side_ on repeat and discussed the likelihood of it being made for _The Wizard of Oz_. She kissed me on the cheek as I headed out the door and promised to come to the wake at least. Mom was set up in the living room on her usual vigil for my nighttime outings, and she smiled with relief when I walked through the door then hugged me and kissed me goodnight.

I wish that I could say that week brought me closer to my family than I had been in quite some time but that would be a lie. Dad dealt with the business end of things while Mom became the hostess. Stevie and Stacey were distracted by the company of the never-ending stream of relatives. Aunts and uncles flew in from the woodworks. I saw people I hadn't seen in years and met some young cousins I didn't know existed. Sarah made good on her word and came to the wake, and when she hugged my dad I swear that his eyes watered for the first time. But he quickly swallowed his sadness and retreated back into his shell then told her to send his love to her family and particularly Georgia. My grandmother had many old friends as well, and she received a sendoff that great women deserved.

She was dressed in the emerald green dress that always reminded me of her eyes and wearing her finest coat and shoes. The wedding ring from my late grandfather was proudly displayed on her finger and had never moved from that spot in the thirty two years they'd been married or the fifteen years since his death. She looked at peace, and I was glad that I had refused to see her while she suffered. At the same time, however, I knew that the thought of her waiting for me would forever haunt me.

I will always remember the weather that day. It rained on and off throughout the service while we were safe inside of her church, but a golden sun peaked out from the clouds as we made our way to the cemetery, and it stayed that way while we paid our last respects. And I smiled a little because it felt like God was matching our tears with tears of God's own. Sadness for sadness. Peace for peace.

I woke up bright and early that Friday morning. Not because I wanted to. It had taken hours to funnel all of the traffic in my grandmother's house back out into the streets or into beds for the night before I was able to get some sleep sometime around one in the morning. It was nearly six thirty in the morning when my alarm dragged me out of my sleep, and I fumbled in the dark to turn it off. A tiny envelope blinked at me from the corner of the screen, and the light burned my eyes as I read a text from Sarah. It had one word in it.

_Go._

Remembering my early morning trips to catch the bus to Chattanooga, she'd set an alarm for me at some point during our dinner date on Tuesday. I shook my head and put the phone back on the nightstand then sank back into the bed. It chimed at me again two minutes later and I rolled over with a groan.

_I'm up at 6:22 right now so that you can get your ass out of bed and go visit your old school._

I let my eyes adjust to the darkness and glanced around the room. I was back like I'd wanted to be six months ago. Pulaski Academy was my Jerusalem, the place that made me, and I was afraid to return as the prodigal son. My phone chimed one last time.

_Get dressed. I'll be at your house in twenty minutes to take you to the bus station. I will take you myself if you miss that bus._

I sat up, scooted to the edge of the bed, and stretched to shake the tiredness from my limbs. "Fine," I said out loud.

My hair was still damp from the shower an hour later as the bus pulled out of the station, and Sarah waved at me from her car. My lethargy was replaced with a dull excitement on the edge of my fear. I was really going back. Two bus rides and four albums later, I finally made it to Devon, Tennessee, home of Pulaski Academy.

It was a raw February day, characteristic of southern winters in which the weather clung to you like the coldest and wettest spring, and wet, moody winds whipped my hair around my face. I stuck my hands in my pockets and trudged through the slush down Bellevue Avenue where the mansions formed a complete essay of American historical development from the Colonial era through the Gilded Age. I had never been privy to the lives of those who lived inside of them, and for the first few years of my time at PA had lived in constant fear that they were haunted.

Pulaski Academy was in a broad sense open to the public. There were no walls to keep people out, and the school blended seamlessly into the rest of Devon, emerging from the trees that lined Bellevue with all of the elegance demanded of the houses surrounding it. However, it looked newer somehow in the six months since I'd been forcibly taken from its grounds. It was more sedate, strait-laced with shiny woodwork like a museum. That's what it had become to me in comparison to the cacophony that was McKinley, and that's exactly what I didn't want. It was vibrantly real to me when it was mine, sparking with life to my twelve year old imagination and then blinking out like a candle six months ago.

It was early afternoon, and I made my way across a deserted yard, called the Pecan Grove due to a layer of pecan shells covering the ground, to Buhler Hall, the largest of the school's signature red brick buildings. It was eerily quiet out since everyone was at sports, and I paused at the giant wooden doors before thinking better of it and turning around. I felt kind of foolish being there and all, and I cursed the weather for chilling me to the bone and ruining the expensive sneakers Quinn had gotten me for Christmas. Sarah had insisted that I visit to the point that she was prepared to make the drive herself, and I wasn't even sure why. But I think she was trying to help me feel some sort of a goodbye.

A few of the younger boys had begun trickling from the gym at the far side of the school—I could just make out their tiny forms from across the Playing Fields which were about 500 yards away past the trio of dormitories and the Field House—and I made myself at home under the eaves of Buhler to shield myself from the drizzle. The older boys made their way out shortly after that; you could tell by their horseplay that they were larger and more familiar with one another.

Fridays were half days at PA, and most boys went home if they lived close enough. I myself had taken the bus to see Emma nearly every weekend my last three years here. So even though my bus to Chattanooga didn't leave until eight thirty, the school would be half empty in the next few hours, and then there was no real reason for me to stick around after that.

I leaned against the doors and stared out at the growing group of boys rambunctiously exiting the gym. They were dressed in their reversibles because of the weather, and I was struck with the thought of the cheerleaders at McKinley and how they blended together into one seamless force. It unnerved me to compare the two: the like-minded wolves of McKinley and the idiosyncratic boys of Pulaski. And suddenly I had such an overwhelming longing to join them that it was all that I could do to slow my feet to a brisk pace.

I trudged through the soggy, coarse grass towards Martin Hall, the dormitory for Junior and Senior boys, and waited outside for one of my old friends to come by. It wasn't a long wait before I began to recognize faces amongst the crowd as it neared; I recognized just about everyone. Six years of this school made it impossible to forget or to be forgotten, and I smiled as I noticed the faces lighting up when my friends finally spotted me.

They wanted to know everything, and I answered their questions as best I could. No, this didn't mean that I was coming back. Yes, my dad got a new job in Ohio and that's why I moved. No, I wasn't still dating Emma. No, I didn't have any condoms for them. Yes, my new girlfriend was rich and a cheerleader. Yes, she'd bought me these sneakers. No, she didn't have any single sisters. Yes, my new school was a public school. Yes, I'd made some new friends. Yes, it was different. No, it wasn't a bad thing. No, I didn't play football anymore. Yes, I went to all sorts of parties. Yes, I'd finally gotten high. No, I barely read my comics anymore. Yes, I missed PA.

Everything about my life was different, and they ate it up like a cheap soap opera. They reminisced about the girls waiting for them when they went home and told me that I was lucky to live a normal life. They chastised me for waiting to leave to finally do drugs and begged me to get high with them before they left for home. They were all waiting impatiently for the day that they, too, could leave PA behind in the dust, only they would never set foot here again if they could help it, but they were excited to see me nonetheless.

They christened me the most fortunate of them, and I didn't comment on the irony of it. Instead I watched their interactions with secret envy. Jared Sullivan, the new quarterback, leaned proudly against his boyfriend, Michael, King of the Screw-Ups. Terrance Trimble, who played lacrosse and performed with the Pulaski Players Theater Troupe, was teaching this scrawny new kid named Jess how to perform a Jedi Mind Trick. Gene, my old roommate, lounged in his comfy chair and had everyone tapping along to _My Dad Is Rich_ by _Draco and the Malfoys_. Even Ackley, my old neighbor, hung around and absorbed it all in.

I tried to imagine this scene anywhere in McKinley but in the Glee Club, and it was impossible. It made me think about those lunches spent with the jocks and how powerless I felt to speak up for Marley and her mom. It took me right back to that party with Sylvia and how she would have rather marched $1300 shoes in her own puke than to come any closer to me. It gave credence to how badly both she and Quinn wanted to escape the life that was threatening to consume them, and it punched me right through the heart.

"This is lame. Man, I wish that you had said something earlier," Terrance said. "I'd have figured something out for while you were here." The other guys grumbled in agreement.

"Yeah, it was pretty last minute," I said. "My grandmother died on Saturday."

"Wow, that sucks, man," Michael said. "I'm sorry to hear that."

"It is what it is," I replied with a shrug. "She's in a better place now."

"I hear that," Jared said. "Better than down here with all of us mentally slow fucks and fags." The rest of the guys laughed, and Michael hit him playfully on his shoulder. "Only I can say that, okay? I'm gay, and I'm not here for nothing. It is PA, you know what I'm saying? Well Mike can say it, too, but I kind of turned him out." Michael huffed and shoved him playfully. Jared smiled and tapped me with his foot. "But for real, though. What's it really like there? And don't lie to me, man. I can tell when you lie."

I shrugged again. "It's really not that bad if you can find your place."

"Find your place?" Ackley asked wrinkling his brow.

"Don't act so goddamn slow, Ackley," Jared said, rolling his eyes, and Ackley balked at that. "I know that I can act retarded sometimes, but you take the goddamn cake. You don't have to repeat everything he says."

"I'm not slow," Ackley said quietly.

"Sometimes you act like it," Jared replied.

"It's fine, Jared," I said quickly to dispel the tension, and Ackley looked at me like I was a traitor. Most of the guys only tolerated him. He wasn't very attractive, he always said awkward things, and he had a terrible personality to boot, but he wasn't _that_ bad. "Yeah, Ackley. Find my place. There're a lot of cliques is all. Not like here."

"Fuck yeah we're goddamn accepting," Terrance said.

He grabbed Jess by the collar and hooked him into a headlock. He gave him a noogie and Jess tried in vain to push him off as the rest of the group laughed and egged him on. They fell to the floor, and Jess punched Terrance in the side a few times before Terrance let him up. Jess's face was beet red, and he looked angry for a moment before giving a forced smile.

"See?" Terrance laughed, messing Jess's hair, and Jess brushed it back roughly when Terrance stopped.

"But you're not stupid," Gene smiled. "You went after the richest piece of ass there. I'd have done the same damn thing!" They broke into peals of laughter. "Not that there's anything wrong with the other girls, but you know. I'm glad you have standards, Sam." He clapped me on the back.

"Yeah, yeah," I said with a small nod.

I thought I saw Ackley frown for a moment. Last year, his family had had some financial struggles and they nearly had to pull him from school. So any negative talk about finances was a sore subject for him.

"Dammit Ackley!" Jared said angrily. "Your parents ain't poor and suffering anymore, and your fucking sulking is making me sick. We're all trying to have a good time with Sam, and you're fucking ruining it."

Ackley's cheeks were red, and his eyes were wide as everyone stared at him. "Sorry," he said quietly, staring down at the ground, and I felt embarrassed for him.

"Aw leave him alone," Michael said, giving Jared a kiss on the forehead, and Jared released a sigh.

Gene turned up the music then, and I made small talk and slowly milled around the room until I'd cornered Ackley. He was wearing a fake smile, but you could see that Jared's words had stung him.

"He's being a dick," I whispered. "You're fine, Ackley."

He looked at me curiously for a moment and let his smile falter. "Thanks," he said quickly. "But…" He sighed and glanced around the room. "Nevermind."

"What is it?" I asked.

He sighed again. "Maybe you could say that in front of the guys. I don't know."

He walked away from me then, and Jared pulled him into a headlock and gave him a noogie and a kiss on the forehead which he feverishly wiped off when he was freed. I understood perfectly what he was asking me to do because it was the same thing that I was struggling to do in Lima. And maybe I had built this whole thing up in my head because of what I had gained academically, but when it came to the social aspect of things, PA was just as horrible as anywhere else.

At some point, Jared asked about snacks, and they sent Jess down to the lounge to retrieve some for everyone. He willingly gave them all up when he returned so that everyone else would be comfortable, and when I noticed him licking his lips as we ate, he politely declined when I asked if he wanted anything. Jared nudged him with his elbow and exclaimed "My boy!" in a way that didn't make me entirely comfortable.

One by one they all eventually left to pack for their weekend visits until it was just Gene, Ackley, and me. I was better friends with Ackley than most, but he didn't know when to take a hint to leave, so Gene told him that we had to go.

"I'll walk you down," Ackley offered, but Gene thanked him and declined, mumbling something about stopping by the infirmary to visit another kid named Joe, who had the flu. In any case, it was effective enough for Ackley to change his mind about accompanying us.

"It was good to see you anyways, Sam," Ackley said. "Give your girl a kiss for me."

I gave a non-committal nod and turned away before my face gave away my disgust, and Gene shook his head as we hurried out the door and down a hill back towards town.

We ran the first leg of Bellevue, partly to heat ourselves up from the cold, but I was still damp from before, and so the cold crept in through my clothes and numbed me. It was the type of afternoon that made you feel like you were disappearing with the cold and wet. Gene slowed his pace then because his bag was starting to feel heavy, and we walked the rest of the way. We sat inside of the bus station, and he obsessively watched the clock and waited for the bus to Memphis.

"So do you really like it up there, or were you just bullshitting for the guys?" Gene took off his jacket and stretched it across the seat next to him to try and dry up a bit before his bus arrived. He glanced at the people around him and pulled his jacket in a bit closer to himself. "I'd definitely understand if you didn't. You know. Public school kids."

I frowned at his description, but he appeared unfazed. "It's different," I replied as I stretched my legs out. "I like seeing girls more often, but no one gets along like they do here, and I do miss that."

Gene smiled and slouched down in his seat. "Shit. We're coddled here. Too much sometimes, I think."

"Actually, I think I'd prefer that," I replied longingly.

Gene shook his head. "It's just a six year shield from the assholes, a false security blanket from the real world. PA is great and all, but this is not realistic." He glanced at the clock and folded his arms. "You are, though. You seem a bit rougher around the edges, but a bit more dapper, too." He nodded towards my shoes. "I bet you have some insane stories to tell. I'm actually glad for you, Sam, for getting a taste of what it's like outside of this. Most of us are going to pass through life without having ever really lived it, but you'll be better than us all."

Gene would be a brilliant orator someday to legions of the poor. I couldn't imagine that it would be out of his range to become a politician or set his sights as high as the presidency. He couched his true message in flowery language that flew over the heads of the underprivileged, and had I been someone else, I might have taken his speech as a compliment. His family was old money, and he had never known true struggle a day in his life. I didn't kid myself to think that I knew what real suffering was, either, but I was humble enough to not be an asshole about it. Gene would coast through life and so would his children and their children after them, and he would never give any real thought to what it meant to be desperate. But he would speak as if he knew, and he would reap the spoils of his fetishization of poverty.

He checked the time again and drummed a beat onto his luggage. "Do you have any plans for the rest of the day? Or were you just planning to bum around PA?"

"I don't know," I admitted. "I was thinking about stopping by to see old Vaughn." Mr. Vaughn had been my advisor my entire time at PA, and he'd finally allowed me into his English class my sophomore year. Both he and his wife, Patricia, were about seventy years old and built like stallions, and I'd grown to really care about the old man. I didn't realize it at the time, but part of the reason why I liked him so much was that he wasn't a phony.

"Well you're not going to find him. He got really sick over vacation and took an indefinite leave of absence," Gene said solemnly.

"Oh," was all I could muster.

Gene glanced outside at an approaching bus then began gathering his things to leave. "Well, it was really good to see you again, Sam," he said. "I wish I'd have known you were coming. I would've stayed this weekend."

"Oh no, it's fine," I reassured him. "It was kind of last minute."

"I guess I'll see you around sometime." Gene tapped me on the back and pushed his way to the front of the queue before disappearing onto the bus.

There was nothing else to notice and nothing else to glean from another soggy trip down Bellevue Ave. Most of the boys staying were younger or had parents who only cared enough to get them an education to fix them, and, to them, that was enough. It was all very careless and confused. And this school bred more careless people who spoke pretty words and then retreated into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and left anyone less fortunate to suffer. PA was a museum that preserved the American Way and made the American Dream a reality for those who already had access to it. They all believed in their own exceptionalism. Those who didn't were few and far between. They were no better than the Lima one-percenters and neither was I.

Changed, I headed back out into the rain to Market Street Cinema, an independent film house down the road. The matinee was a showing of the Richard Donner cut of _Superman II_. That movie always killed me. I ate dinner at _Bluth's_, a dive hidden in the back corner of the shiny, designer Le Parker Meridien hotel with nothing more than a simple neon hamburger sign clueing you to its presence. And as I boarded the bus leaving Devon a short while later, I remembered something that made me glad I was getting the hell out.

There was this little kid named Brian Cooper who'd come to PA a few years ago. He was about ten, and I thought he was absolutely brilliant. Just imagine a scrawny ten year old kid wearing the old navy and gold of Pulaski with his black hair sticking up everywhere and his round glasses that didn't really help his cause. I don't know. He was walking around that first day with all of his books, and he had to be smarter than everyone in his class to be ten and coming to PA. He kind of reminded me of Stevie, even though Stevie was younger, so I felt like I needed to protect him, you see.

He was clumsy, and I remember him carrying all of those big books, and it wasn't a surprise when he fell all over himself in his rush to learn the campus, and everyone laughed except for me. This one teacher, Mr. Pelzer, berated him for his clumsiness and encouraged him to get a backpack, but no one was helping him. And when I finally made it over and grabbed up some of his books, he looked at me with eyes the size of saucers and finally mumbled a thanks. He didn't last long at PA. No matter what programs the school had to offer to help him with his problems, he couldn't find his place. I couldn't be his savior every moment, and without the ability to save himself, there was no hope for him.

The rest of the week was a blur as Dad began the slow process of getting Grandma Jean's affairs in order, and we bid farewell to family we might not ever see alive again. I went out with Sarah one last time before leaving, and she gave me her copy of _The Outsiders_.

"An early birthday gift," she whispered in my ear then kissed me on the cheek and gave me a wry smile. "If you were three years older, I could've fallen in love with you. Don't be a stranger, Sam."

I realized as we were driving away that everything I'd ever wanted in Tennessee was gone. Grandma Jean was dead. Emma had fallen in love with someone who wasn't me. Sarah had Freddie. PA was no longer mine. Sawyer had left me years and years ago. Everything there died with my grandmother, and there was nothing I could do to change things.

* * *

AN: This chapter is titled _What Sarah Said_ or _You Are A Tourist_ both by Death Cab For Cutie.

Pop culture referenced in this chapter includes Etch, a restaurant in Nashville; Starbucks; the American Way; the American Dream; American Exceptionalism; _The Dark Side of the Moon_ album by Pink Floyd, as well as the tracks _The Great Gig in the Sky_ featuring Clare Torry and_ Money_; _The Catcher in the Rye_ by J.D. Salinger; _A Separate Peace_ by John Knowles; _The Great Gatsby_ by F. Scott Fitzgerald; Bellevue Avenue; Hendrix College; _My Dad Is Rich_ by Draco and the Malfoys; the prodigal son; _The Wizard of Oz_; _Arrested Development_; Burger Joint; Market Street Cinema; _The Outsiders_ by S.E. Hinton; _Lightning Crashes_ by Live; _The Wonder Years_; and _Superman II: The Richard Donner Cut_. I also like to think that Sam listened to the albums _Reasonable Doubt_ by Jay-Z; _Illmatic_ by Nas; _Good News For People Who Love Bad News_ by Modest Mouse; and _Viva la Vida, or Death and All His Friends_ by Coldplay on his trip to Devon.

I named his friend Sarah French after one of my favorite bosses of all time. Her sister Georgia is named for George from _Dead Like Me_, and her brother, Nathan, is in the Air Force in Germany because a friend recently shipped there.

I thought that it was important for Sam to explore his feelings about his home town to provide an avenue for him to detach from it. He's lived with a venerated memory of his time at PA and home in general and in going back, he sees the flaws in his worldview. The ex who promised to wait is pregnant. PA kids only care for their own and barely. I wanted to use this chapter to help Sam destroy his pedestal because home no longer feels like home.

Sam's reasons for refusing to see his grandmother are the same reasons I gave when I was twelve years old and my favorite uncle, James Nathan, died. I asked my mother how he looked in his ICU bed, and she told me about the wires and the machines keeping him alive, about how he barely looked like himself, and though I was crying because I recognized his time was near I couldn't bring myself to see him when he was so fragile. He died the next day, and I'm glad that I don't have that memory. As for Sawyer's death, that's based on the death of someone that I never met, but it is also based in fact. When I was an RA, the dean of our college told us this story about one of her former RAs, and I never forgot it. Something in how much he cared about other people's safety above his own always stuck with me, and I thought that having Sawyer go like that would be one of the most honorable ways to go.

This is only part one of the "death chapter". The explicit exploration of this subject continues into the next chapter which I've already begun and which deals with the people back in Lima. I am so excited to put it into words that you can definitely hope for it much sooner. I had originally planned to combine the two and this part would have been much shorter, but the trip home became its own separate but necessary entity and deserved its own spotlight to help Sam come to terms with the closing of that chapter in his life.

Also, I profusely apologize for the use of the "R" word as well as the "F" word and all of the horrid ways in which the boys at Pulaski spoke. Perhaps there was a better way for me to show that they were horrible people, but that's what they are, and that's one of the main reasons that I haven't written Finn and despise him.

Please feel free to comment and critique. I love you all. Thank you!


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